


for the secrets you can't sing

by Alcheminx



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Eventual Smut, Explicit Language, Implied Relationships, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Mutual Pining, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Slow Burn, Smoking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-11
Updated: 2016-11-11
Packaged: 2018-08-08 01:11:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 32,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7737241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alcheminx/pseuds/Alcheminx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For Iwaizumi, it is simple: </p><p>Treasure what you have, work hard for what you don't, and do not, under any circumstances, fall in love with a musician. </p><p>Unfortunately for him, the universe and Oikawa Tooru definitely have other plans.</p><p>(Or: That one Band AU where Iwaizumi is a tattoo artist, Oikawa just wants to make it big, Mattsun is so hot that Makki is actually suffering, and everybody else shows up at one point or another.)</p><p>* Delayed updates because of school. I'm so sorry, please bare with me.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> To be honest, I can't quite believe that I'm finally publishing the first chapter of this. This AU has been bouncing around in my head for almost an entire year, growing and blooming and becoming a living, breathing, thing of it's own, and I am so happy to finally be sharing it somewhere other than the confines of my head.
> 
> This one is going to be a long, painful ride, but I promise you that everything is going to work out in the end. I have a lot planned for this little universe here, and I hope you can come to enjoy this story as much as I've enjoyed creating it. It truly is my baby.

“Hajime, I think I’m going to _die_ ,” Hanamaki groans, and Iwaizumi reluctantly tears his gaze away from the sketch in front of him to give a pointed look at his best friend.

It is far past midnight in the little piercing and tattoo shop in the corner of downtown Sendai, and he has to visibly squint past the fluorescents flickering above the both of them in a feeble attempt to get his eyes to adjust to something other than the now neglected tattoo design in front of him.

He is happy to find Hanamaki situated exactly where he should be, feet adorned with a pair of translucent Doc Martens and kicked up on the front desk in front of him, but the pinched expression that is starting to form between his barely-there eyebrows is far from his usual, bored look.

He looks downright miserable, everything from the pale of his cheeks to the bead of sweat starting to trickle down the side of his temple working to emphasize his declaration, and as he hangs his head over the backside of his chair to direct an upside-down grimace at Iwaizumi his stomach gives out an absolutely pitiful grumble to match.

Iwaizumi sets his pen down with a defeated sigh.

It is way too late for this.

“I told you not to do it,” he scolds, making sure to let as much agitation as he can show in his words, but all it pulls out of Hanamaki is another distressed groan.

“I really don’t need your whole parental disappointment routine right now,” he whines.

“Then _listen_ to me next time when I tell you _, for the hundredth time_ , to not eat the-“

Hanamaki cuts him off before he can even think about finishing berating him with the loud squeak of his chair coming to a standstill underneath him. He stands, abrupt enough to nearly knock over a planted cactus adorning the counter top, and his fingers go stark white with their impossibly tight grip around the edges of the table in front of him. “Please watch the desk,” he begs.

Iwaizumi blinks at him tortuously slow. By this point, he has lost all focus on the project in front of him. What he had once started an hour ago with such vigor and concentration was now nothing more than an endless mess of ink and overlapping pen strokes, and he knew well enough by the heaviness tugging at his eyelids that it was time to turn in for the night - but all of that information didn’t make him any more willing to trade in his task for watching the front desk. The front desk was bad enough during the day, it was practically a death wish when it came to night shifts.

His head is assaulted with a sudden unwelcome amount of memories of bad customers, and he drags his hand down his face with an agitated groan. “I refuse. After what happened last time, _I refuse_.”

Hanamaki looks like he’s about to cry. “Listen, I’m sorry, I fucked up. I fucked up and I should have listened to you and now my ass is paying the consequences and I won’t ever do it again, _blah blah blah_.”

Iwaizumi gives him a skeptical look. “You say that every time, and then every time we have night shift you do it again.”

Hanamaki’s face twists into a genuine look of horror as he throws his hands up. “Sue me, Hajime! I’m poor! _We’re both poor_! I can’t afford to live off anything other than sketchy, hole in the wall restaurants. It’s not my fault that you have significantly better luck than me when we start playing Russian Roulette with them.”

“It has nothing to do with luck,” Iwaizumi grumbles. “I just don’t keep going back to the same places that keep giving me _food poisoning_.”

Hanamaki’s stomach gives out another loud, grumbling complaint, and all trace of argument immediately vanishes from his face. “Hajime, buddy, my best friend, my number one pal, I will literally pay you every last bit of money I have in my pocket right now – which just so happens to only be 500 yen – if anything happens while I’m gone. Just please, _please_ take the front desk.”

Iwaizumi raises an unbelieving eyebrow. “I thought you were poor.”

Truthfully, he is surprised that Hanamaki even currently has that much to his name. What, with how much Iwaizumi knows he blows on both weed and copious amounts of food to combat said weed.

“Hajime, if you don’t shut up right now and let me go, I am literally _going to shit on the floor_.”

The threat weighs heavy for a mere moment, but in truth there was a considerable list of disgusting things that had been on the surface of their shop floor in the past. Being both located in the very downtown of Sendai and a grungy alternative shop came with its downfalls, and those downfalls mainly consisted of a less than considerable customer base. Still, Iwaizumi was positive that he was absolutely _not_ ready to add human feces to that list. He was even more positive that he was absolutely not ready to have to _clean up_ said human feces.

“Just _go_ ,” he grumbles, rubbing another exasperated hand down the length of his face, and Hanamaki is off and running towards the bathroom door before all of his words are even done working their way out of his mouth. He is nothing more than a blur of pink and desperation, the highlighter yellow of his obnoxiously coloured socks blending into the tile floor underneath him, and then he is slamming the door shut behind him with a force that is strong enough to rattle the picture frames on the wall.

“ _Idiot_ ,” Iwaizumi mumbles underneath his breath, and makes a show of rolling his eyes towards the ceiling even though no one is around to see it anymore. He hopes, bitterly, that Hanamaki can somehow see it through the walls anyway.

Something tells him that his annoyance is the least of Hanamaki’s concern right now, though. He visibly grimaces at the thought.

Reluctantly, he tears himself away from his nice and secluded work cubicle in favour of taking the seat for front desk and tries very, very hard to not think about what Hanamaki’s ass was just currently doing to said seat. His elbow automatically finds the surface of the desk underneath him as he balances his cheek lazily off the underside of his palm.

The antique clock above the shop door is doing its best to keep its gears turning, and Iwaizumi lets a sigh slip past his lips despite himself when he realizes that it is proudly showing off the right placement for 5:00 AM. One more hour of this hell. One more hour until he can stagger back into his shitty old shared apartment and collapse until the next shift.

He loved his job, he really did. It was just incredibly taxing sometimes.

He considered himself lucky to have his job at all, if he were honest. It was the job that he had dreamed about ever since he was a kid. Some days, he even found himself still having to shake himself out of a daze to remember that it was all real. He had worked impossibly hard to get where he was, had put countless hours into every stroke of ink he pressed across paper, and yet at the end of the day he still felt undeserving of it all.

In retrospect, there were very few positive things in his life that he felt deserving of at all. It was just the way he worked – just the unfortunate way that he had been programmed. He did not accept anything outright unless he had earned it fairly, and even then he had trouble recognizing that he had done enough to earn it at all.

Iwaizumi was always busy encouraging others, but he was not the kind of person to take the time to ever congratulate himself. His talent was recognizing the potential in the people around him. He did not think to ever waste that talent on someone as replaceable as himself.

That, however, was surely not his only talent.

His main focus had always been art.

He had fallen in love with it so incredibly quickly when he was a kid. Before he could walk, before he could read, before he could even form _words_ he had fallen in love with it. He had never been good with words, anyway. There was a disconnect there, a significant kink in his wiring when it came to translating feelings and thoughts and emotions into coherent sentences, and so he had spent the majority of his life translating them into entire canvases instead.

When those canvases turned out to be something that other people could understand, Iwaizumi realized that maybe there was something more there.

And so now he was a tattoo artist barely making enough to get by in a shitty, hole in the wall shop in the heart of downtown Sendai. He could only wish that that shitty, hole in the wall shop was something that he could say was _his_.

The bell above the front door suddenly sounds, loud in the otherwise deafening silence of the empty shop, and Iwaizumi reluctantly pulls himself out of his own head and his eyes away from the chipping checkerboard pattern of the floor in favour of directing his gaze towards the entrance.

“Welcome to Miyagi Ink,” he greets, an apathetic welcome that is practically formatted to memory by now, but as his eyes finally lock onto the customers collecting in the entryway he almost immediately wishes he hadn’t bothered to say anything at all.

If Hanamaki’s bowels hadn’t already killed him, Iwaizumi definitely was going to when he got back.

This was exactly what he had been trying so desperately to avoid, and if their collected noise alone hadn’t drawn Iwaizumi’s attention, than the sheer _smell_ of them no doubt would have. It is an overwhelming aura of cheap beer and too-fragrant cologne that hits his sinuses as soon as they tumble through the door in a collective heap, and Iwaizumi feels his mood immediately spiraling downwards with just the sight of them.

They are a three man whirlwind of laughter and chaos, and as one of them reaches forward to catch themselves from stumbling on the edge of the front desk Iwaizumi makes quick to catch the teetering cactus pot from almost falling onto the floor for the second time that night.

There is no patience wearing thin, here. His patience is definitely already gone.

“Hey!” the clumsy one slurs, and Iwaizumi only directs him an annoyed, furrowing eyebrow as he steadies himself enough to look up and flash him a smile. Iwaizumi's knuckles are already turning white around his grip on the pot.

The growing annoyance doesn’t seem to deter the guy, however, and he only takes the opportunity to straighten himself up and shoot Iwaizumi another blinding ( _and far too enthusiastic_ ) smile.

It is the first good look that Iwaizumi finally has at him, and the only thought that comes to the forefront of his sleep exhausted mind is how downright _ridiculous_ this guy’s entire appearance is. He is not sure what he is going for, exactly, but Iwaizumi can’t help but think that he is failing miserably at whatever it is. Iwaizumi did not consider himself a judgemental person – nor did he claim to be well versed ( _or even versed at all, really)_ in all things fashion – but even he was finding it hard to not question what was going through this guy’s mind when he decided to put his look together.

He had dealt with a lot of weird customers in his line of work, but this guy’s hair was something else. It was dyed pure white and adorned with a plethora of black stripes, but even that wasn’t the weirdest part of it all – the weirdest part was that Iwaizumi was pretty sure it was _literally defying gravity_. It was sticking up so straight and so seamless that Iwaizumi was positive that if he stuck his hand out to touch it it’d surely crumble into pieces underneath all of the hairspray.

He deliberately moves the cactus far out of reach of the counter top. Better safe than sorry and all that – and plus, somehow, he’s pretty sure that this guy’s hair would come out on top if they were to collide.

He does not offer a hello in return, customer service skills be damned, but it does nothing to diminish the smile on the guy’s face. He really wants to chalk his unnerving friendliness up to his being drunk, but Iwaizumi has no doubt that this is just his regular personality.

He opens his mouth to speak again, eyebrows crinkling down into the beginnings of concern, and Iwaizumi barely has a chance to catch the sight of an eyebrow piercing there before he is cut off just as quick by one of his friends tossing an arm around his shoulder and effectively tugging his head downwards.

“Sorry about that, good ol’ Bo here can’t seem to distinguish his left foot from his right whenever he gets a little bit of alcohol in him,” the friend smiles, a slow stretch of mouth and lip that somehow ends up coming off a lot more predatory than it does apologetic.

Aside from the unruly mass of dark hair adorning his head, Iwaizumi is silently thankful that this one looks considerably more normal in comparison. He still isn’t sure whether or not to pin the bedhead down to the drunkenness or not, though.

Bo, which Iwaizumi figures has got to be short for _something_ , let’s out a wheezing laugh on cue into Bedhead’s side, and Bedhead shoots a skeptical gaze in Iwaizumi’s direction as he drags his friend’s head down further to muffle the sound into the side of his shirt. He thinks, silently, that Crazy Hair is a much more suiting nickname than Bo could ever be.

Bedhead’s eyes crinkle around the edges, an attempt at friendliness, and Iwaizumi notices just how light of a golden brown they are as the overhead lights catch hold of them. There is no doubt in his mind that this guy is considerably more sober than his giggling counterpart, but he does not miss how bloodshot and drowsy his gaze really is underneath all of the quiet intimidation.

The both of them are not small by any means - even from his barrier behind the counter Iwaizumi can tell that they are on the fair side of 6 feet - but even though it is clear that the struggling friend underneath his arm is the one packing all of the muscle in their relationship, there is a cunningness in the dark-haired ones gaze that makes even Iwaizumi’s stomach twist uncomfortably.

He gets the impression that they are not a pair that you want to get on the bad side of. He can only hope that their drunken stupor into the shop didn’t come with any ill intentions besides meddling.

Fighting was not in his job description, and he preferred to be a pacifist anyhow.

“Is there anything I can help you with?” he dares. He does not try to hide the annoyance in his voice.

Bedhead’s eyes light up immediately at the question, more mischief than happiness at finally being acknowledged, and Iwaizumi immediately realizes that he has made a terrible, terrible mistake.

“So nice of you to ask!” he smiles, wide and shark-toothed, and then he is abruptly spinning himself and his friend around to direct what Iwaizumi imagines to be another predatory gaze at the last person in their little group.

Crazy Hair whines with the movement, grabbing a fistful of shirt at an attempt to steady himself as his shoes squeak in protest, and promptly looks like he’s about to vomit all over the shop floor. Iwaizumi directs a mournful glance at the clock above the doorway.

“ _Oh Tooru~_ ” he practically purrs, waving a tattooed arm in his direction, and his friend immediately stills. “Did ya hear that? Mr. Sunshine here wants to know if there is anything that he can _help you with_.”

Iwaizumi purposefully ignores the ironic nickname in favour of allowing himself to appreciate the impressive half sleeve that Bedhead is sporting. It is artfully done, a swirling design of mostly black and white that appears to collect into the shape of a lunging black panther, but it only manages to capture his attention for half a second before it is suddenly and abruptly stolen away by the sight of his friend turning around.

He had been ignoring his presence before in favour of using up his minimal patience on the two nuisances in front of his desk, but now he is filled with a sudden regret for not noticing him sooner. He had been quiet, merely squinting up at a flashy print of a polka-dot dalmation adorning the shop walls, and Iwaizumi had not considered him a threat.

What he had also failed to consider, however, was the chance that he would be _fucking beautiful_.

Iwaizumi couldn’t even bring himself to come up with anything more eloquent. He did not fail to notice that Bedhead was handsome, did not neglect to realize that even Crazy Hair had a unique kind of attractiveness to him, but the both of them were nothing in comparison.

When he turns, it is with a fluttering of thick dark eyelash and warm chocolate eyes, and Iwaizumi’s breath immediately gets caught in his throat along with it.

There is so much of him to take in at once, the fine sculpt of jawline, the elegant slant of nose, the pale of perfectly untouched skin that melts into a wave of coppery hair, and Iwaizumi knows that his eyes have been lingering for far too long already when Bedhead clears his throat with amusement next to him. He tears his gaze away the minute warm chocolate eyes lock onto his own and suddenly becomes very interested in a crack in the desk in front of him.

The Pretty One whispers something, hushed and slurred beneath his breath to Bedhead, and Bedhead lets out an annoyed grumble in response. When Iwaizumi finally gets the courage to direct his gaze back towards the two of them he is surprised to see that they are both already staring down at him at once – Bedhead all challenge, The Pretty One the weirdest mix of anxiety and cockiness. Bedhead has seemed to release Crazy Hair from underneath his arm, and Iwaizumi’s nose wrinkles up despite himself when he realises that he has taken the opportunity to let his face fall into a snoring, drooling, mess on Bedhead’s shoulder instead. He really isn’t sure how he is even managing to stand up at this point.

“Did I miss something?” Iwaizumi asks, raising an eyebrow at their unwavering, matching stares. He purposefully angles his gaze towards The Pretty One just for an excuse to stare at him again.

Bedhead’s lip twitches with the beginnings of a sentence, but then The Pretty One is opening his mouth all at once. “Don’t you know who I am?” he asks.

Iwaizumi’s eyebrows skyrocket higher. _Should he?_

“No?”

All amusement vanishes from The Pretty One’s face in one fell swoop, and Bedhead has to angle his face into his shoulder to suffocate the beginnings of a laugh that begin to bubble up his throat. He looks downright _offended_ , his mouth gaping in and out of shock, and Iwaizumi can’t even bring himself to appreciate how nice his voice sounded around the words on the way out with the newfound realization that everything about this guy’s demeanour downright screams _cocky_.

He had been so beautiful. Of course he had to go and open his mouth and ruin everything.

He hiccups sadly, the sound catching even himself off guard and making him jump, and Bedhead laughs so hard it can’t even begin to be confined by the expanse of his shoulder anymore. Past the obvious offense taken, The Pretty One kind of looks like he is going to cry. Iwaizumi has to rub his eyes just to make sure all of this is really happening and he’s not just dreaming up a horrible nightmare in the middle of his night shift.

“I’m sorry?” he offers to him weakly.

“ _He doesn’t know who I am,_ ” The Pretty One reiterates, staring wide eyed into nothingness, and Iwaizumi silently prays that his sober personality is nowhere near as horrible as his drunk one.

Bedhead lets out a laugh so loud he doubles over and has to make quick of catching his still drooling, snoring, friend before he hits the floor.

Iwaizumi suddenly does not care about how pretty this guy is, he just wants them all out of the shop.

“Listen,” he grits through his teeth, “it’s nearly 6:00 AM. I have no clue what is going on or what any of you want to begin with, but I did not sign up to deal with this tonight. If you don’t have any reason for being here then I’m going to have to ask you all to please just _leave_.”

The Pretty One’s soulless gaze does not waver. Crazy Hair lets out a particularly loud snore.

“Hey, hey,” Bedhead smiles, an attempt at peace that does nothing to quell the anger stirring in Iwaizumi’s stomach. “Don’t get your panties all in a twist, we came here intending to be paying customers.” He fists his hand into his pocket and waves around a good couple thousand yen for emphasis.

The ‘ _I’m most definitely poor and could desperately use that_ ’ part of Iwaizumi’s conscience gives in. “What do you _want_?”

“You do piercings, right?”

“Yes.”

Bedhead’s eyes roam with interest over Iwaizumi’s form before he’s dropping an elbow on the front desk and leaning into his space. “ _All_ kinds of piercings?” he purrs.

Iwaizumi’s eyes trail over to The Pretty One, whose gaze is now back to normal and locked onto the floor underneath him. He goes considerably still at Bedhead’s question.

“Yes,” Iwaizumi says quietly.

“ _Perfect_!” Bedhead chimes, straightening back up and slinging a playful arm around The Pretty One’s shoulders. “Did ya’ hear that, Tooru? They do _all kinds of piercings_.”

“I’m going to _kill_ you,” he mutters underneath his breath.

Iwaizumi raises an amused eyebrow at their interaction. They are extremely close, both in proximity and without a doubt relationship too, and he silently kicks himself for starting to wonder whether or not they might be dating. He shouldn’t be interested in The Pretty One’s relationship status. He had already established that his personality was awful.

“My boy Oikawa here just so happens to be very interested in getting a friend, if you will.” Bedhead smiles, all teeth, and The Pretty One visibly chokes on his spit.

Huh, _Oikawa_. So that was his name – where was it that Iwaizumi had heard it before? Surely, he had not met him. He had meant it when he admitted to not knowing who he was. He had a face that Iwaizumi was sure not to forget.

Oikawa squawks something of protest at Bedhead, and Iwaizumi pointedly ignores it in favor of trying to remember where he had heard the name before to no avail.

When his mind turns up nothing, he decides the least he can do is reply to them. “A _friend_ ,” he says suspiciously, reiterating the point just to make sure he had really heard it right.

A friend? What, were they still in middle school?

“Yes. A friend. _A dick piercing_.” Bedhead beams, and Oikawa’s face goes bright red.

It really isn’t a bad look, Iwaizumi has to admit.

At this point, it is near impossible to tell whether or not they are still trying to get a razz out of him. Oikawa clearly seems reluctant towards the whole ordeal, and he is the most clean cut out of all of them – not a piercing or a tattoo to be seen – but it is something about the way he is objecting to Bedhead and Bedhead alone that makes Iwaizumi think that the whole situation runs much deeper than reluctance. There is a weird power imbalance here, something in the cocky smirk on Bedhead’s face that tells Iwaizumi he’s enjoying Oikawa’s reaction far too much, and Oikawa’s reluctance is laced with too much playfulness and not enough panic to be a reaction of genuine fear.

He is not a stranger to having people walk in for dares alone, to having customers grit their teeth through piercings and tattoos just for the sake of proving their fragile masculinity alone. He can’t help but think that this situation doesn’t stray far away from that. He also can’t help but wonder what Oikawa possibly could have done to get himself in such a mess with someone with such a cunning smile as Bedhead.

It all seemed like a dangerous game to him, but as it turned out Iwaizumi was without a doubt going to be Oikawa’s saving grace today.

His eyes trail away from Oikawa and Bedhead’s quiet argument in favor of the still-closed bathroom door, and by the time he focuses back on them again Oikawa has gone considerably paler. “Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but as it turns out our piercer isn’t actually here right now.”

 _Lucky him_ , Iwaizumi adds bitterly to himself.

Oikawa lets out what is without a doubt a sigh of relief, and Bedhead’s face falls into a second of brief disappointment before Iwaizumi sees an imaginary lightbulb of an idea flash behind his eyes. “What about you?” he asks.

“ _Me_?”

“What do you do? Can’t you do piercings?”

Iwaizumi directs a more-than-annoyed glance at Bedhead. “I don’t do piercings, I’m strictly a tattoo artist.” He does not miss the way that Oikawa’s eyes light up with slight interest at his words.

“ _Ugh_ ,” Bedhead groans, throwing his head backwards and immediately having to steady Crazy Hair again with the abrupt movement. Iwaizumi has no idea what the three of them had possibly gotten up to before they arrived in this shop, but Oikawa and Bedhead were both incredibly sober in comparison to the mess that was still slobbering all over the shoulder of Bedhead’s black t-shirt. He was either an incredible light weight, or had been subject to another one of Bedhead’s cunning smiles and subject to a considerable more amount of alcohol in comparison to his friends because of it. That he was sure of.

Iwaizumi really wasn’t sure why he was even bothering to talk to these guys anymore. He should have kicked them out ages ago. He should have kicked them out the moment they entered the shop in a giggling, drunken mess of pure havoc.

“Listen,” Bedhead sighs, leaning forward into Iwaizumi’s space and squinting in concentration. “Iwaizumi, is it?” he asks, lightly flicking at the name tag adorning his shirt and sending it spinning before straightening back up.

Iwaizumi stills it forcefully. “ _Yes_ ,” he grits out.

“Great,” Bedhead smiles, eyes crinkling around the edges in attempted friendliness again. “Iwaizumi, I really need you to do us a favor here. Are you sure there isn’t any way you can hook my buddy Oikawa up with a piercing tonight?” he jabs his thumb in Oikawa’s direction for emphasis, and Oikawa only sends a childish pout back in his direction.

“ _Absolutely not_. I’m not qualified.”

“Right,” Bedhead nods. “Qualified, right. Okay, well, here is the thing – how much qualification does it really take to stab a needle through somebody, y’know? I can’t imagine it’s that hard. You’ve probably seen it done more than a million times, so you and I both know that you already have more knowledge about this whole thing than me, yeah? I offered to Oikawa to do it myself, but he was very adamant about declining. I’m not quite sure why, I told him it’d be painless, really. Just a two second procedure, I could use one of those big safety pins we always have kicking around in the back of the tour bus, and then _pop_ , all done y’know?” he makes the _pop_ sound off his lips, and Oikawa visibly pales, no doubt at the memory of the suggestion alone.

It is a conversation filled with far too much drunken idiocy for Iwaizumi to handle, but even amongst his annoyance he does not miss the mention of _tour bus_. What did he mean by that, exactly? Was that why Oikawa had been so baffled by him not knowing who they were? Were they famous enough to need a _tour bus_?

He decides to dwell on it later, and instead takes the opportunity to take a deep breath just to calm himself down enough to answer. “It takes a lot of qualification, actually,” he nearly growls, “ _especially_ when you’re dealing with sensitive areas.”

The corner of Bedhead’s mouth tugs down into a disappointed grimace. “That’s what Oikawa was saying too, what a shame.”

Iwaizumi really does not understand why the two of them are filled with so much desperation regarding the situation. It’s not as though there wouldn’t be any more opportunities for them to harass another shop to give them a piercing in the middle of the night.

Plus, even if Hanamaki currently _wasn’t_ out of commission and nearly dying in the bathroom there was no way in hell any of them were getting a piercing tonight.

“It doesn’t matter,” Iwaizumi sighs, pressing his fingertips against a building pressure point at the side of his temple. “Even if our piercer was currently available, we wouldn’t be able to pierce you. It’s against policy to pierce someone under the influence, you can’t properly consent.”

Bedhead’s eyebrows shoot up with interest. “ _Oho_ , did you hear that Tooru? He’s all for consent. We found ourselves a good one.”

Iwaizumi does not miss the sexual undertone. He casts the worst glare he can muster in Bedhead’s direction. Oikawa directs an equally annoyed glance the same way.

It only lasts for a couple seconds before Bedhead is shooting Oikawa an apologetic smile and Oikawa is giving up just as easily.

Iwaizumi suddenly finds himself to be the focal point of a pair of chocolate eyes. He swallows nervously despite himself. “What about a tattoo?” Oikawa asks.

“Same thing,” Iwaizumi grumbles, “absolutely no tattooing unless there is written consent and you’re sober.”

Oikawa’s eyes narrow slightly, a meaningful and cunning look that Iwaizumi thinks such beautiful eyes should never be able to make, and then he is leaning forward and puffing a hot breath right next to Iwaizumi’s ear. “No exceptions? Not even for me?” he practically purrs, and Iwaizumi immediately feels goosebumps rise on his arms.

He feels like an idiot for thinking that there was a power imbalance between Oikawa and Bedhead before. It is suddenly very, very clear why the two of them are friends.

Iwaizumi scrambles backwards quicker than he thought possible, desperate to get away from the close proximity to Oikawa and what it is currently threatening to do to the lower half of his body, and the wheels of the chair beneath him scream loud in protest as the entire thing tumbles onto the floor in his panic.

A wheel spins endlessly behind him on the bottom of the chair, and Oikawa takes a mere second to blink in disbelief until a pleased expression is tugging at the corner of his mouth. If Iwaizumi had thought that Bedhead’s smile from before had been predatory, then Oikawa’s expression now is nothing less than bloodthirsty.

His eyes lock onto the name tag on Iwaizumi’s chest like a predator to its prey, and he makes sure to make direct eye contact, heavy lidded and purposeful, as he tries the new information out on his tongue. “Iwa-“ he manages, expression faltering slightly through the slur of his words, and his face pinches down into one of frustration as he struggles to get the words out.

He tries once more, even more slurred than the last and to no avail, before an idea lights up behind his eyes. “ _Iwa-chan_ ,” he singsongs, the nickname practically a purr inside his mouth, and then Iwaizumi is on his feet and grabbing Bedhead and Oikawa by the back of their shirts.

“Hey!” Oikawa yelps, surprise littering his voice, and Iwaizumi does not even stop long enough to feel satisfied at catching him off guard.

He practically rips the door off its hinges in his desperation to get it open, the bell above it chiming nosily, and then he is shoving both Oikawa and Bedhead out the door at once with as much strength as he can muster.

They both tumble into the darkness in unison, Oikawa vocal about his treatment and Bedhead laughing manically as he struggles to get Crazy Hair awake and out the door with him.

Iwaizumi does not think twice about closing the door. He does not check for rogue limbs potentially being caught. He just slams it shut and locks it behind him with all that he has.

“ _Seriously_?” Bedhead gets out between fits of laughter, his voice muffled but still coherent through the glass, and Iwaizumi only directs an annoyed expression at him in return from the other side. “That’s all it took? All of that and what finally made you crack was _Oikawa giving you a cutesy nickname_?”

“Get out,” Iwaizumi grumbles, far past the point of patience, and Bedhead aims a knowing smile in his direction. It makes his blood boil instantly.

“We are most definitely _out_ already. You made sure of that,” he laughs, and then busies himself with trying to pick a still snoring Crazy Hair off the ground beneath them.

“Hey, Bokuto, wake the fuck up,” he pleads, nudging him with the edge of his shoe, and Bokuto lets out an agonized groan as he puts himself into sitting position.

So Bo was short for something, after all.

“What did I miss?” Bokuto slurs, rubbing furiously at his eyes with the edges of his fists, and Iwaizumi silently curses him for being fortunate enough to sleep through the entire ordeal.

Bedhead leans down in one swift movement, slinging Bokuto’s arm back over his shoulder and pulling him into standing position, and gives an affectionate ruffle to the top of his hair. Iwaizumi notes that it does not, in fact, crumble into pieces under the touch. “Not much buddy, don’t worry about it. How ya’ feeling?” Bedhead asks.

Bokuto’s only response is another agonized groan.

Bedhead lets out another goodhearted laugh before directing his attention back towards the pouting form of Oikawa behind him, already beginning to stalk off into the darkness. “Hey, Princess, do you mind helping me out with this big lug? I don’t really feel up to dragging him back ten plus blocks.”

“You and him can both die in this alleyway for all I care,” Oikawa huffs, hiking his shoulders up to his ears, and then Iwaizumi loses sight of him completely as he ducks out of the light and down the street.

Bedhead gives a half-hearted sigh at the sight of his retreating form before turning back to Iwaizumi. “He’s upset because his advances didn’t work on you, by the way. He's not used to being rejected. He’s not that awful all the time, promise.”

“Somehow I doubt that,” Iwaizumi grumbles. He does not mention that his advances were indeed very, _very_ close to working on him.

Bedhead shrugs once. “Really, he’s not a bad guy, no matter what people sa-“ he stops himself, eyebrows knitting together in concentration, and Iwaizumi suddenly wishes he had the guts to ask him to continue his thought.

“Anyway,” Bedhead hums, waving his hand in an act of nonchalance. “It’s not a big deal. Sorry if I came across as a jerk back there, I just really enjoy getting a razz out of him when I can and when you add in a little bit of alcohol I’m not the best at controlling myself.” He takes a moment to adjust Bokuto’s weight on his shoulder and directs a small, closed-mouth smile in Iwaizumi’s direction. He can’t help but realize that it might be the first genuine one he’s seen all night.

“I gotta’ get this big lug back before he vomits all over my nice new shoes, but have a good night,” Bedhead hums, and then he is giving the smallest wave before the sight of him and a half unconscious Bokuto are disappearing into the darkness after Oikawa.

“Good night,” Iwaizumi ends up muttering to nothing but the darkness on the other side of the glass, and he takes a mere minute to steady his breathing before he is flipping the OPEN sign to a definite premature CLOSED without a second thought.

Iwaizumi mentally makes a promise to himself that he will never, _ever_ , make night shift a thing if he is ever fortunate enough to own his own shop.

His mind is a sudden mess, and a very large part of him is still hopeful that he is dreaming all of this after all.

_Oikawa._

_Where had he heard that name before?_

The antique clock above his head chimes into a solid 5:30 AM, and the door to the bathroom finally creaks open behind Iwaizumi with a sudden unwelcome flood of light into the shop. 

When Iwaizumi turns himself around slowly to direct a glare at Hanamaki, he immediately stills.

He is somehow paler and sweatier than he was before he went in, the bright pink dye job of his short hair a tousled mess, and Iwaizumi really, really does not want to think too hard about what was happening in there that took an entire _half hour_ to complete.

Iwaizumi’s expression and the look of fear on Hanamaki’s face in response to it, however, is probably enough to let him know that Iwaizumi’s half hour out here was _definitely_ more hellish.

“…Hajime?” Hanamaki questions quietly, the dark of his eyes unblinking and cautious.

“You owe me 500 yen,” Iwaizumi grumbles, mouth twitching slightly, and then he is shouldering past Hanamaki and towards his cubicle to pack up as quickly as humanly possible. He deliberately stops breathing as he passes the bathroom. “Please use it to buy an air freshener.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I ever become known as "that one author who wrote that fanfiction about Makki almost shitting his pants" that's when I know that I'll be able to die happy.
> 
> Links: [here](http://alcheminx.flavors.me)
> 
> P.S: The symbolism of a cactus is: "Everything that you need is already inside of you, do not allow an imperfect environment prevent you from blossoming into something, and creating something, beautiful."
> 
> Cool, huh?


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all of the positive feedback on the last chapter, it really encouraged me to keep writing and get the next one out as soon as possible.  
> Apologies for the title change also, I'm still struggling to come up with something I'm happy with.

It is an unusually quiet morning in Miyaki Ink’s little corner of downtown Sendai, the always busy streets filled with nothing but the stir of a warm summer breeze, and Iwaizumi can’t stop himself from taking a minute to bask in the silence of it all as the toes of his worn out sneakers finally come to a standstill in front of the shop.

It is still far too early to be up and functioning at all, even for someone as well acquainted with mornings as himself, but the sign above the doorway displays a bright and early open time of 6:00 AM regardless, and so Iwaizumi is stuck digging around, half asleep and still drowsy, in the confines of his pant pockets for his keys while the sun still struggles to make its way over the horizon.

The ridiculous store hours were starting to drive Iwaizumi crazy. Nights shifts, as bad as they were, at least guaranteed a delayed 12 PM open the next day - but if a day of work called for no night shifts at all, then it would guarantee an open before the sun was even up. It seemed like the shop was hardly ever closed at all.

Hanamaki lets out an audible huff of dissatisfaction behind him, purposefully loud enough to be heard, and then there is a heavy weight - _other than_ the weight of heavy eyelid threatening to drag Iwaizumi back down into the fists of sleep - on his shoulder.

It catches him off guard for half a second, more due to his lack of being awake than anything else, and he hitches his shoulder in a half-assed attempt to shrug him off. This is practically routine by now.

Unsurprisingly, like every other day, it does absolutely nothing to shake Hanamaki from his resting place.

Between the two of them Hanamaki definitely has the leverage when it comes to height, and though really it is nothing more drastic than a three couple inches, he uses it and all of the lankiness that comes alongside it to a clear advantage.

That advantage, as it turns out, is being able to flop the entire weight of his body down on Iwaizumi’s shoulders in the morning when he’s decided that he’s had enough of standing up. Admittedly, he decides a lot more often than Iwaizumi would like that he has had enough of standing up.

“Get off of me dumbass,” Iwaizumi grumbles, hiking up his shoulder in a slightly more aggressive shove to no avail.

Hanamaki does not even budge slightly. Instead, he just curls himself inward further and presses the entirety of his lanky body against Iwaizumi’s back. “Tired,” he mumbles, “don’t wanna.”

“What?” Iwaizumi snaps, switching hands to dig into his other pocket when his first search turns up nothing key related, “You think I’m not? I just have the god damn courtesy to not use my friend like they’re a _human pillow_.”

“Aw, don’t be bitter,” Hanamaki whines. “I’d offer to let you nap on my shoulder every once in a while, but you’re just too small. There is no way you could reach.”

Iwaizumi’s temple throbs instantly with the beginnings of a headache, and he has to close his eyes and steady his breath to stop himself from turning around and giving Hanamaki a well-deserved wakeup call featuring his fist.

When he turns his head slightly to the side to angle a well-deserved insult at him instead and is met with nothing but a puff of cotton candy pink hair in his face, he immediately regrets not deciding to go with the fist after all.

“ _Makki_ ,” he warns, his voice a downright growl of irritation. “I’m going to give you exactly _three seconds_ to get the fuck off of me before my shoulder decides to give you a bloody nose.”

 “Aw, _c’mon Haji_ -“

“One.”

“Seriously?!”

“ _Two_.”

“Why do you always have to be such a grump in the morn-“

“ ** _Three,_** ” Iwaizumi hisses, and the unruly mop of pink instantly vanishes from its place on his shoulder with the words.

His fingers finally make contact with the cold metal of his key in his pocket, and as he twists it into the lock and drags his feet into the shop Hanamaki lets out a delayed whine behind him.

“If you’re going to work out as much as you insist on doing, then you might as well put the assets that come along with it to good use,” he sighs, kicking the door closed behind them with his foot.

The bell above the door sounds noisily, announcing their arrival, and Iwaizumi immediately feels like turning back around and going home with the way it makes his temple ache all over again. “What are you implying?” he grumbles back.

Hanamaki makes a squeezing motion in the air with his fingers. “Good biceps make great pillows.”

Iwaizumi might not be able to see his own face, but he without a doubt knows that it is currently pulling itself into the most annoyed grimace it can manage. Hanamaki only shoots back a cheeky grin in return as he slips into his place behind the counter and tosses his feet up on the desk. Beneath the translucent material of his shoes, his socks are bright pink today and adorned with a repeating pattern of bright yellow bananas.

Sometimes, Iwaizumi seriously questioned why out of all humans, this is the one he had chosen to take the title of his best friend.

“You’re insufferable,” he finally sighs.

Hanamaki has already made himself comfortable, his mouth busy around one of the hundred suckers Iwaizumi knows he keeps stashed in one of his drawers, but he stops long enough to stick his tongue out in childish defiance at the comment. The overhead lights catch and glisten off of the small ball of silver situated on his tongue before it disappears back into his mouth. “You say that now, but we both know you couldn’t live a day without me,” he hums, and kicks a leg off the desk to send himself spinning in his chair.

He knocks down a considerable stack of papers piled on the desk with the movement, and Iwaizumi reluctantly bends down to pick them up off the floor and shuffle them back into order. He is suddenly very positive that he would survive just fine. “Might I mention that your professionalism is also astonishing,” he comments dryly.

Hanamaki immediately stops spinning. “Don’t give me that. You literally used a pair of keys with a Godzilla keychain attached to unlock the doors this morning.”

Iwaizumi self-consciously shoves the pair of said keys deeper into his pockets. His cheeks suddenly feel a little hot. “Shut up.”

“ _Uh huh_.”

A self-satisfied smirk flashes across Hanamaki’s face for a mere moment, and then he is busy leaning forward and squinting down at the appointment book in front of him. His mouth makes a lewd popping sound as he pulls the sucker away from his mouth again to speak. “The rest of the gang aren’t supposed to start piling in here until at least noon,” he comments, waving the abandoned candy around in his hand with the words.

Iwaizumi chances a glance out the window. By now the sun has finally managed to work its way over the horizon, and the street outside is beginning to slowly fill with people on their morning commutes to work. The information that the rest of the world finally seems to be awake doesn’t do anything to lessen the tiredness still tugging at his eyelids, though.

“I doubt we’ll be busy before then, anyhow. I don’t know why the boss keeps insisting on such early opens. They get about as much business as the night shifts do, which isn’t saying much.”

Hanamaki lifts a shoulder in an attempted shrug. “Punk doesn’t sleep and all that. We still get the rouge customer every now and again, and money is money I guess - however little.”

A previously flickering lightbulb above their heads chooses that exact moment to die out and flicker into darkness, and Iwaizumi sends a mournful glare its way. “It’d be nice to see that rumoured money be put somewhere other than the bosses pockets for once.”

Truthfully, Iwaizumi had to admit that he barely knew the guy. He had met their shared boss a total of maybe twice since he had begun working for his company, and he had been working for a considerable amount of time. He was fresh out of high school when he had walked into a sketchy shop with a hiring sign in its window, and just moments ago he had unlocked the door to that very same shop with his 22nd birthday far behind him.

The first meeting had been brief, barely enough to be called a meeting at all, and Iwaizumi had been hired with as little as a two second, uninterested glance at his portfolio. Since then, it was nothing more than a once a year check in to make sure no one had managed to burn the entire shop down yet. The boss was an older man, probably on the generous side of his 50’s, and it was clear that he had no interest in his business other than what it could do in terms of adding a considerable weight to his pockets.

Sometimes, when he allowed himself to think about it for too long, the entire idea of it did nothing but make Iwaizumi’s blood boil. He did not do what he did for the money, and he hated the idea of being thought of as nothing more than a pawn in an elaborate business plan. More than that, though, he hated that this man had absolutely everything that he had ever dreamed of and didn’t even care enough about it to take the time to appreciate it. He held no passion for what he had created. Iwaizumi was overflowing with nothing but.

The light gives one more dying flicker before it burns out completely.

 _One day_ , he reminds himself sadly, and reluctantly tears his irritated gaze away from burning holes into the already crumbling ceiling.

The image of Hanamaki’s concerned expression greets him, but Iwaizumi only manages to catch it for a second before it is just as quickly disappearing from his face and being replaced with a yawn.

“Well,” he hums, without a doubt trying to divert Iwaizumi’s attention elsewhere, “I don’t know about you, but if we keep getting scheduled for nothing but night shifts and opens then I’m going to die of sleep deprivation. Money be damned.”

Iwaizumi decides to worry about it later. A yawn tugs around the corners of his own mouth. “Agreed. What appointments do I have planned for today, anyway?” he asks.

Hanamaki goes back to glancing down at the appointment book in front of him, toying back and forth with a chunk of lip that he has managed to catch between his teeth. They are already considerably red in colour from his sucker alone. “Nothing major until 2:00. You do have a good couple of tattoo drafts that potential customers requested that you could draw up in the meantime, though.”

Iwaizumi nods. “Sounds good to me.”

Hanamaki shuffles through a clearly disorganized pile of papers for a good couple minutes, and then he is wordlessly handing over a stack. It’s not a bad lot, a good handful of ideas to keep Iwaizumi busy for the majority of the morning, and he feels his fingers twitch in anticipation to get working already as he makes contact with them.

“What about you?” he asks first, “Have any interesting appointments this morning I should know about?”

Hanamaki shakes his head. “Nah, it’s been pretty quiet on my end for business ever since the dick piercing incident I somehow missed out on.”

Iwaizumi visibly cringes at the memory. It had been nearly a week since that horrendous night, and he had nearly managed to supress it enough to forget about it entirely. When he had had enough time to lower his blood pressure back to normal and had told Hanamaki about it the next morning over breakfast, he had laughed so hard he fell off their dining room chair.

Iwaizumi had found the whole ordeal considerably less funny.

“Don’t even,” he hisses, “I don’t want to relive the memory.”

Hanamaki muffles a laugh behind his hand.

“Alright, alright,” he complies, fighting the beginnings of a smirk tugging at the edge of his lip. “I won’t make you go through the trauma again. But seriously, I wish I was there to see it myself. It would’ve been the most exciting thing I’ve dealt with in weeks.”

“Try not to shit your pants in the middle of a shift next time, then, and maybe you’ll be able to.”

All beginnings of a smirk instantly die on Hanamaki’s lips as he shoots a murderous glance Iwaizumi’s way. “I did _not_ shit my pants.”

“Right.”

“I _almost_ shit my pants. There is a distinct difference.”

Iwaizumi raises an eyebrow. “Do all of the guys you constantly string along know about how disgusting you really are?”

Hanamaki shoots him a devious smile. “Absolutely. Though I must admit, they know in very _different_ ways.”

“Okay, _way_ too much information I did not need to know.” Iwaizumi’s face twists into an unimpressed grimace. It only makes Hanamaki’s smile stretch further.

It was not untrue that Hanamaki had a considerable amount of guys trailing after him at all times. Being both roommates and best friends, it was not something that Iwaizumi wasn’t used to hearing about - or, unfortunately, _hearing_ in general - but it was also something that in all honestly did not faze him at all. Hanamaki had been playing games since high school, and Iwaizumi could care less about who he chose to play his games with. He didn’t care about what his gender preference was when it came to his partners, and though it was clear from early on that Hanamaki took an interest in guys and guys alone, Iwaizumi was not one to pass judgement. _Especially_ when he found his own sexuality seeming to waver more so from person to person instead of gender to gender as he got older. In the end, he liked people for who they were and who they were alone. Nothing else really mattered to him.

Hanamaki’s promiscuity did not matter to him either, really, but he couldn’t help but feel that it always seemed like he was searching for something more and continuously coming up empty handed. Sometimes, he really did worry for him, but it was a worry that he made sure to keep quiet at the back of his mind. A silent wish that one day, somehow, he would find whatever it was that he was looking for.

He feels his brow starting to furrow with the thought, and he quickly straightens it back out to stop himself from getting lost inside of his own head. It is a thing that he had been known to be notoriously bad at, but as his fingers twitch with wanting around the stack of work in his hands again he realizes that now of all times is definitely not the time to indulge in it.

“Hey, Makki,” he says instead, and Hanamaki lifts his head up and away from a stray sticky note where he was beginning to doodle to direct his attention at Iwaizumi.

“What’s up?”

“I’m going to go try and get some sketches done before everyone else shows up, try not to get so bored you attempt to pierce yourself in some weird place again.”

“Absolutely no promises on that one.” Hanamaki smiles, and Iwaizumi makes sure to give him a good smack over the head with his stack of papers before he makes his way over to his cubicle.

* * *

 

Iwaizumi loses himself as soon as he presses pen to paper.

It is inevitable every time. There is just something about it, something about the connection between ink and paper, something about seeing everything trapped inside his head come to life in front of him with the mere motion of his wrist. It that makes him forget about the world entirely. When he is here, when he is hunched over the beginnings of a design, nothing else matters.

Everything around him falls into silence.

It is such an incredible feeling, such a well needed quiet for the things he can usually never seem to silence bouncing around in his head, but it is never a quiet that seems to last long enough for Iwaizumi.

It feels like only mere minutes have passed when Iwaizumi realizes that he has a complete stack of drafts to his side, and suddenly nothing underneath the surface of his pen. If he is honest, he knows that he has drawn far more than he needed to, but as he casts a wistful glance at his empty work space he can’t help but feel as though he has still not drawn nearly enough.

When he decides to reluctantly break the spell and chance a glance out of his cubicle, the antique clock above the doorway is nowhere near as close to 2:00 as he would like it to be.

Hanamaki is still situated at the front desk, looking bored out of his mind while he flips through a magazine, and Iwaizumi notes that it has at least been enough time for him to switch out his sucker for a piece of gum instead. He blows, and promptly pops, an impressively large bubble with disinterest.

It is loud enough to sound across the store, and much to his own dismay, Iwaizumi feels himself finally coming back down to earth with it.  It is enough of an atmosphere change at least to make him pull himself off his chair and untangle himself from his now disregarded ear buds.

When he finally manages to work his way back into the storefront, he catches the sight of one of their other tattooists, Watari, and gives him a small wave. Apparently he had been lost enough to miss out on his arrival entirely, too.

Hanamaki raises a knowing eyebrow at his return. “Finally returned from the mother ship?”

“Very funny,” Iwaizumi grumbles, making a swipe at Hanamaki’s head. He ducks out of the way effortlessly.

By this point, Hanamaki was well aware of Iwaizumi’s terrifying work pace, and even more so of the eventual boredom that came afterwards when he finished it far too fast for his own good. He flips another page in his book with disinterest, which this close Iwaizumi realizes is another one of his million fashion magazines, and the image of a beautiful brunette women takes up the majority of the page. The soft brown of her eyes are the most unsettling mix of sweet and intimidating as she stares at the camera, and Iwaizumi can’t seem to look away from it.

“Wish I could tell you that I have more for you to do, but you’re shit out of luck unless we get a walk in,” Hanamaki sighs. When he flips the page, Iwaizumi’s interest in the magazine suddenly dwindles out with it.

Instead, he takes the moment to chance a glance across the street. It is late enough in the day now for the morning rush to be over, and the streets have returned to their steady rush of shopping passersby’s instead. A lot of them appear to be teenagers, weighed down with shopping bags and enjoying their short summer vacations from school, and Iwaizumi feels himself smile slightly at how carefree they all look.

That had been him, once.

His eyes fall to the image of a white-haired man shuffling his way across the street, hands full with several bouquets of flowers threatening to fall over, and Iwaizumi follows his path higher to another darker-haired man waving happily at his departure.

The moment Iwaizumi’s eyes settle on him he stops the motion of his hand, brown of his eyes moving to make contact with Iwaizumi’s own, and even from the distance he can see his eyes crinkle around the edges when he smiles back and directs a far less frantic wave Iwaizumi’s way.

“Hey,” Iwaizumi calls, more to the glass than Hanamaki behind him. His own hand automatically moves to give a small wave back at the man across the street.

“ _Hm?_ ”

“I’m going to take an early lunch. I’ll be back in an hour.”

Iwaizumi finally breaks eye contact to face Hanamaki again, who just shrugs a shoulder in an act of apathy. “Don’t gotta’ tell me. I could care less if you decided to take a _5_ hour break. Hell, I could care less if you never came back at all. Run, run away, get out of here while you still can.”

When Iwaizumi moves to swat him upside the head for the second time that morning, this time, it connects. He rolls his eyes as Hanamaki makes a show of rubbing the side of his head in complaint. “Don’t be a drama queen,” he scolds.

“Just _go_ already. You’re a workplace hazard,” Hanamaki pouts.

“As if you’d know anything about workplace hazards,” Iwaizumi sighs, and pulls the door open before Hanamaki can make any more smart comebacks.

The bell above him chimes nosily with his exit, and his feet automatically move to walk across the street.

* * *

 

It is a shop considerably nicer than the one that Hanamaki and Iwaizumi spend the ( _unfortunately_ ) majority of their time in, and Iwaizumi feels at home every single time he steps through the doorway.

There are no flickering lightbulbs and no gaudy checkerboard floor pattern to be seen, and that, in itself, is a god damn heaven sent in Iwaizumi’s books – but that alone was not the reason as to why he had fallen in love with the place as easily as he did.

The shop, in all of its entirety, was just an incredibly beautiful place to be.

Everything was bright and elaborately painted, from the dark green of the front desk to the swirling pattern of sunflowers covering the shop walls, and everywhere you looked there was a flourishing pot of some flower or another threatening to grow right out of its soil and into a forest of its own. There were vines with budding rosebuds crawling across the ceiling, a rainforest of leaves curling it’s way around the entryway, and amongst all of the plant life the first thing that one would be greeted with, every time, was the fresh smell of baked goods and brewing tea.

It makes Iwaizumi stop short, caught off guard all over again just like the first time at this magnificent little corner of the world, and he is only allowed a moment of reflection to take it all in before someone is popping up from behind their place at the desk and shattering the moment.

There is a quiet commotion, the sound of scattering metal tools as the person behind the voice struggles to tear themselves away from whatever they were immersed in, and then the sight of a blinding smile greets Iwaizumi.

“Hey!” the voice starts, frantic but genuine even though the person has still yet to make eye contact, and Iwaizumi feels a small smile tug at the edges of his lips. “Welcome to the Crow and - _oh_!”

The man stops, dead in his tracks even as the potted daises in his hold threaten to fall over, and the deep brown of his eyes go wide as he sends an owlish blink in Iwaizumi’s direction.

“Iwaizumi-san?” he asks.

The daises wobble again with the realization, a considerable amount of soil tipping over the edge and spilling onto the man’s arm, and Iwaizumi can’t help the laughter that builds up in his chest as he crosses the store and moves out a hand to quickly catch it.

He makes contact at the very last moment, the perfectly arranged pot landing safely in his grasp, and steadies it carefully on the front desk with a smile. “I thought I told you a long time ago to drop the honorifics. Hey, Daichi.”

Daichi’s gaze immediately wavers back to the saved daisies in embarrassment, and a high blush rises on his cheeks. Iwaizumi can’t help but notice that he has a considerable patch of dirt smeared there. “Ah – sorry, Hajime. It’s been a little bit of a crazy morning over here.”

Iwaizumi takes a seat on one of the brightly painted stools near the front desk. “I can tell,” he hums, busying himself with running a delicate finger over one of the daisies petals. “Even from across the street, it looked like you had a pretty good sale earlier.”

Daichi has turned his attention back to collecting the work tools he had dropped on the floor earlier, but his back immediately goes stiff with Iwaizumi’s words. “A good sale?” he echoes.

Iwaizumi is not one to meddle, but the reaction almost instantly peaks his interest. His eyebrow skyrockets upwards despite himself as he rests his chin on his palm to lean closer. “ _Mhm._ White-haired guy? Probably around our age? Running across the street with more flowers than one man should be able to carry? You were waving at him like a madman.”

Even from behind, Iwaizumi does not miss the way Daichi’s ears go red around the tips. It only works to intrigue him more.

He had definitely been spending too much time around Hanamaki lately.

“Oh,” Daichi says breathlessly, “him.”

“Is he a regular or something?”

Daichi finally gets his tools in order enough to face back towards Iwaizumi, but Iwaizumi does not miss the way he purposefully does not look him in the eye as he makes busy to start putting them away. “No…no, definitely not a regular.”

“Interesting,” Iwaizumi hums.

Daichi toys with his lip for a moment, caught between wanting to say something more and not quite knowing how to say it, and lets out a sigh as he decides to brush his hands off on the bright orange of his apron instead. “How is business over at the shop?”

Iwaizumi decides to not say anything about the obvious subject change for Daichi’s sake. “Painfully slow, the usual.”

Daichi shoots him a sympathetic look before ducking back down underneath the counter to pull up another collection of potted plants. Thankfully, this time, Iwaizumi does not have to make quick to save any from an early death.

His gaze wavers back to the daises beside him, petals soft underneath the calloused pad of his fingers, and it makes him look back to Daichi with appreciation. “These are nice, are they new?”

Daichi’s face instantly brightens with the question. “Sure are, I just finished growing them last night, actually. I know they’re a simple flower, but they’re so underappreciated and I’m really happy with how they came out in the end. I’m thinking if I put them in a nice flower arrangement they might sell well – maybe with a couple of chrysanthemums?” he hums, tan finger stroking the underside of his jaw in concentration, and Iwaizumi smiles quietly down at the flowers in front of him.

He had been friends with Daichi for a long time, ever since he had started working at the tattoo shop, and he had never stopped admiring him for his unwavering passion. When he had learnt that a flower shop was opening across the street, he instantly knew that he would get along with whoever he would find in it. He was not expecting to find out that it was something that Daichi himself had built, that the shop was his very own, but in the end it only made Iwaizumi admire him more. Daichi had achieved, at such a young age, what Iwaizumi had wanted to make a reality his entire life. There was so much light in Daichi’s eyes whenever he spoke about what he loved, and Iwaizumi knew that it was the kind of light that reflected in his own when he was drawing.

There was just something about passionate people that drew Iwaizumi near.

“They’re one of my favourites,” Iwaizumi says quietly. “They were the first thing I ever remember painting.”

It is not a memory that Iwaizumi feels like he can forget even if he tried. He had spent so much time at his grandmothers when he was young, so many summers laying in the grass in her garden and staring up at endless blue sky and slow moving clouds. Back then, he was nothing but bruised knees and dirty shoes and gap-toothed smiles. It was the naïve kind of happiness all unknowing kids possessed.

His grandmother had gardened often, had an impressive forest in her own backyard, but it was always daises that she came back to. It was always daises that took up the majority of her yard, always daises that she let overgrow and turn into an entire world of their own. Iwaizumi had taken one look at them and fallen in love.

 _“They’re the underdogs,”_ she had said when she caught him one day staring at, for once, something other than endless skies. Iwaizumi remembered it perfectly, her sunhat casting shadows over the quiet kindness in the lines of her face, the slim form of her fingers a caress over a fallen petal as her voice became nothing more than a whisper among the warm breeze. “Someone has to look out for them. Someone has to take the time to love them for what everyone else can’t be bothered to see.”

When she passed away a year later, Iwaizumi was the only one to place a canvas full of daises atop a mountain of meaningless roses.

Daichi smiles at him with the confession, a quiet kind of smile only meant for two people, and Iwaizumi is suddenly reminded of why he is so thankful for his friendship. They had both known far too much about loss in their short lifetimes.

“Iwaizumi-san?” Comes a voice, timid and familiar, and with it Iwaizumi angles his body to direct his attention to its source.

While Iwaizumi had been happy to hear of a flower shop coming to town, Hanamaki had maybe been even more appreciative of the new shop when he found out that it was _also_ a bakery ran by Daichi’s childhood best friend.

That childhood best friend, as it turns out, ended up being a giant, cowardly mass of man named Asahi.

When Iwaizumi’s eyes fall onto the form of him, standing awkwardly and out of place in the opening to the café section of the shop, he automatically shoots him the most genuine smile he can muster just in hopes of getting the nervous expression on his face to settle.

“Hey, Asahi,” he greets.

He is wearing an apron similar to Daichi’s, bright orange and adorned with a small black crow in the corner underneath their shop name of ‘ **CROW & GROW CAFÉ**’, and what Iwaizumi knows to be at least shoulder length hair is tied up into a tight bun atop his head. His height, alone, should make him intimidating – but it is everything about his entire demeanour that does not.

He seems to relax slightly with Iwaizumi’s greeting, but the nervous glance in his eyes doesn’t quite go away. It never does, really. “How are you?”

“Good as I can be, I suppose. How about you?”

“Ah – good,” Asahi stutters, scratching the back of his head in embarrassment. “Did Daichi, by chance, ask you yet?”

“ _Ask me_?” Iwaizumi echoes, raising his eyebrows in confusion at Daichi, who promptly looks like he wants to crawl into a hole and hide. He waves his hands in rapid hushed surrender at Asahi before Iwaizumi catches him. “Ask me what?”

Daichi’s eyes trail off to the side, clearly avoiding the question, and Asahi looks like he’s about ready to make a run for it.

“ _Ask me what_?” Iwaizumi asks again, impatient.

“You’re going to say no,” Daichi groans.

“ _Please_ say yes,” Asahi whines.

Iwaizumi’s eyebrows furrow with annoyance. “I can’t say _anything_ if you don’t ask me.”

“It’s…about that customer.”

Iwaizumi is definitely interested now. “The customer?”

“He, uh,” Daichi stalls, still avoiding eye contact as he plays with a lock of dark, finely buzzed hair. “He came in specifically because he needed to buy bouquets for a show…and then, he…well he invited me to said show? Gave me 3 VIP tickets, even?”

“I don’t see the problem?”

Asahi suddenly looks incredibly guilty as Daichi looks his way. “Well, uh, you see…I really would like to go? But it’s not my usual scene, and I can’t build up the confidence to go alone. Asahi downright refuses to come along with me, and it’d be a shame to waste the tickets after he was kind enough to give them to me for free…”

“Every single time I go to one of those things someone tries to force me into a mosh pit,” Asahi whines. “Absolutely _no_ part of me wants to be in a mosh pit.”

So it was _that_ kind of show. No wonder Daichi didn’t want to go by himself, he didn’t exactly look like the kind of guy who would show up to anything that involved potential moshing. With his finely buzzed hair and clean wardrobe, he looked exactly like the kind of guy you’d find stuffed in a flower shop drooling over possible flower arrangements.

Which, as a matter of fact, _he was_.

Daichi was also not wrong about his rejection, though. Iwaizumi did not do that kind of thing anymore.

“No way in hell,” Iwaizumi says, stern, and Asahi promptly looks like he’s about to cry.

“Please don’t make me have to be dragged there by Daichi,” he pleads.

The pathetic look on Asahi’s face tugs on Iwaizumi’s heart strings a little, but he does his best to remain stern on his decision. “Didn’t you say you have 3 tickets, anyway? Even if I _did_ agree to go, which _I’m not_ , Asahi would still have to come.”

“Ah…” Daichi murmurs, chewing his lip in a way that looks nothing but downright guilty to Iwaizumi. “Well…I was going to ask Hanamaki to come instead, so Asahi wouldn’t have to.”

Oh, _fuck._

Hanamaki would _definitely_ want to go.

Hanamaki would also _definitely make Iwaizumi go_ if he got word about it.

Iwaizumi’s head falls onto the counter with an audible _thump_ , and he groans into it in defeat. “That’s a dirty move, Sawamura.”

“Sorry,” Daichi mumbles, but Iwaizumi doesn’t believe it for a second. “You never do anything anymore, though. It’d probably be good to get out every once in a while, right? Hanamaki keeps saying he’s worried about you…”

Iwaizumi lets out a considerable sigh into the counter top before pulling himself back up to look at Daichi.

His words weren’t untrue, technically. For the past couple of years he had refused to do anything other than work, and it always took a lot to get him out of the house to do anything else. He knew that Hanamaki was concerned, had heard it out of his own mouth once or twice, but he didn’t know how to make him stop worrying.

He was okay, really. He was _fine_.

He was just a little tired, that was all.

The longer he looks at the concerned expression on Daichi’s face, the guiltier he feels. Daichi was not a good liar, not good at manipulation, and nothing that ever flitted across his face was anything short of genuine. Whether it be Hanamaki or Daichi, Iwaizumi did not want his friends to worry about him.

“Why do you want to go so badly, anyway?” he asks quietly.

“N-No reason…” Daichi stutters, colour rising on his cheeks again, but Iwaizumi decides not to question it. He’s sure that he will find out the reason for it later, when Daichi is ready to tell him himself.

“You can give them to me if you want,” Iwaizumi sighs, and holds out his hands for the tickets in defeat. “I’ll give them to Makki at least, and see if anyone else around the shop would be interested in going, but there is no way you’re getting _me_ there.”

Daichi looks a little sad, but he places the remaining 2 tickets into his palm anyway. Asahi lets out a considerable sigh of relief behind them.

“Um,” Iwaizumi mutters, suddenly remembering his manners. “Thanks for thinking of me anyway, I really appreciate it.”

“Sure thing,” Daichi says quietly, and then busies himself with stepping out from behind the counter to tend to some of the flowers on display.

Asahi takes a tentative step forward with his departure, and gently presses a warm paper bag into Iwaizumi’s hands.

There is an instant waft of baked goods that fills his senses as soon as Iwaizumi comes into contact with it, and he looks at Asahi in question.

“Y-You’re on lunch, right?” he stutters, and Iwaizumi nods wordlessly at him in return. “I just thought that maybe you’d like some stuff from the bakery? I…uh…I put some cream puffs in there for Makki, too, I know how much he likes them…”

Iwaizumi suddenly finds himself feeling thankful for his friends all over again. “You didn’t have to-“ he begins, but Asahi is quick to cut him off.

He shakes his hands in front of him in surrender. “Hey, uh, don’t worry about it. It’s on me. That’s what friends are for, right?”

Iwaizumi directs a quiet smile at the counter top. “Right.”

Something beeps in the distance, and Asahi quickly apologises for having to leave before he rushes off into the other room after the sound. Iwaizumi figures he should probably take the opportunity to get out of here himself, too.

“See ya, Daichi,” he hums, pulling the door handle open and clutching his bag of goods tightly at his side, and Daichi gives him a half-hearted wave goodbye behind a stack of watering cans.

* * *

 

“What the ever loving _fuck_ are you wearing?” Iwaizumi grumbles, and Hanamaki only shoots him a devious grin in return.

It is dark outside, dark enough for the bright pink of his hair to become a muted magenta, but it is nowhere near dark enough for Iwaizumi to miss the absolute train wreck of a shirt that he has decided to wear. It is bright pink itself, a signature in Hanamaki’s wardrobe, but that is not why Iwaizumi is so personally offended by it.

He is offended because, as it turns out, it might be the ugliest thing he’s ever seen in his life.

It is a practically a crop top, cut jagged around the bottom and high enough to show off Hanamaki’s pierced bellybutton, and in huge, bedazzled lettering across the front, it has the word **‘BITCH’** written in English.

It is enough to make Iwaizumi visibly face palm.

“It’s supposed to be ironic, Hajime, _god_. Get with the times.” Hanamaki rolls his eyes, and Iwaizumi again, for the hundredth time in ten minutes, has to ask himself how he ever got himself into this situation to begin with.

Considering it is Hanamaki, of all people, he does not doubt that it is intended for the purpose of irony and irony alone. He understood his sense of humor even less than he understood his sense of fashion.

Joke or not, however, it did not change the fact that he is stuck, grumpy and already annoyed, in the dark outside of a loud club in the heart of downtown Sendai alongside Daichi and Hanamaki, and seconds away from doing the thing he had so adamantly refused to do just earlier that afternoon.

He did not want to go to this show. He had _no_ intention of going to this show.

But Asahi, god damn Asahi, had been clever enough to stick a pleading note into the bag alongside Hanamaki’s creampuffs, and that was all it took for him to come up with an elaborate plan to drag Iwaizumi here.

Apparently, all it took to get Hanamaki on someone’s side was a couple of baked goods.

Daichi stifles a laugh, low and rumbling against his sleeve at Iwaizumi’s and Hanamaki’s exchange, and Iwaizumi’s irritation spikes as he instantly turns on his heel to direct a glare at Daichi instead.

“Oh, don’t even get me _started_ on you. You have no right to laugh about this. You did know where we were going tonight, right? What are _you_ wearing?”

Daichi’s laugh automatically dies on his tongue, and he squints in confusion down at his outfit. It is a finely pressed get up consisting of black pants, shiny dress shoes, and a neatly ironed dark blue dress shirt. “What’s wrong with it?” he asks, genuinely confused.

“We’re going to a _club_ , Daichi,” Iwaizumi groans. For a brief moment, he wonders whether or not hitting his head hard enough against the pavement would be enough to knock himself out and give him a legitimate excuse to have to go back home.

Daichi has the dignity to look embarrassed, and Hanamaki nearly barrels over as he lets out a howling laugh. Yes, the whole knocking himself out thing suddenly sounds very good right now.

“What are you, a fashion expert? You have no right to judge,” Hanamaki wheezes between laughs, “you’re literally wearing what you wore to work.”

Iwaizumi furrows his eyebrow in annoyance. “It’s all black. It works for every occasion. And I’m sorry, but I didn’t exactly expect to be _dragged here_ tonight.”

Daichi opens his mouth to speak, no doubt a genuine apology brewing on the tip of his tongue, but Hanamaki just rolls his eyes at Iwaizumi’s rebuttal and tosses an arm around Daichi’s shoulder to lead him towards the doors of the club before he can say anything more. Iwaizumi follows, albeit a bit reluctantly.

The line is considerably shorter than when they first got there, their argument without a doubt running into show time, and Iwaizumi can already hear the muffled sounds of music trickling out from behind the doorway.

He hands his ticket, annoyed, to the bouncer while trying to get a peek inside, but said bouncer suddenly gasps at the contact.

“Hey!” he shouts, far too loud of a volume with how close he is standing to Iwaizumi, and Iwaizumi chances an irritated glare his way before he is suddenly wishing he didn’t. “It’s you! The grumpy guy from the shop!”

Iwaizumi _knows_ this voice. It is the same one that had made him want to break the front desk in half just barely a week ago. When his glare finally lands, it is on the very last person he had wanted to see tonight. He thought being forced here was going to be bad enough. Way to add fuel to the fire.

Bokuto smiles, far too enthusiastic for someone being sent a death glare, and Iwaizumi realizes he was 100% right when he assumed that his previous drunkenness had nothing to do with his overwhelming energy. He really _was_ just like this all the time.

“What are _you_ doing here?” Iwaizumi snaps.

Bokuto’s smile does not even waver slightly. “I work here!” he says cheerfully, “Or…er, well, I guess I work for the band playing here?”

Iwaizumi suddenly regrets even asking. He didn’t want an answer, anyway.

His hair is still as wild as ever, and beneath the collar of his t-shirt Iwaizumi notices a tattoo he hadn’t before, what looks to be the wings of an owl in the same pattern and design of Bedhead’s panther. He can’t help but admire it, even if it is a piece of art that is attached to a person he very much does _not_ admire.

“Great,” Iwaizumi sighs, stopping him before he hears his entire life story by accident. He waves his ticket and ID impatiently back and forth in front of him as Daichi and Hanamaki send him a confused look from inside. “Can you please just check my ticket and ID already? I want to hurry up and get this over with.”

“Get this over with?” Bokuto echoes, but much to Iwaizumi’s relief he takes the ticket and replaces it with a brightly coloured VIP bracelet around his wrist. “Why would you want to-“

Iwaizumi does not even give him a chance to finish before he’s shouldering past him and joining his friends in the entryway. He thinks he hears a cry of “enjoy the show!” behind him, but he purposefully tunes it out. If Crazy Hair is here that probably means that Bedhead is too, and he doesn’t want to draw any more attention to himself than necessary and end up being their target in a place that he _can’t_ kick them out of.

Hanamaki raises a questioning eyebrow at him as he joins them, but he purposefully ignores him. He can think whatever he wants of that entire exchange for all Iwaizumi cares.

“Shall we go sit?” Hanamaki asks, beginning to make his way towards the VIP area, and Iwaizumi reluctantly follows him. Daichi trails not far behind, focused but clearly not on where they are going, and Iwaizumi suddenly finds the frantic darting of his eyes to be incredibly interesting.

Was he…looking for something?

Someone?

A loud strum of guitar fills the room and stops the thought immediately, a chorus of excited screams rising up all around them, and Iwaizumi stops in his tracks instantly as he focuses in on the main stage.

The lights are dimmed low, casting shadows across the faces of the band members, but then they all flick into a kaleidoscope of bright, strobing colours in unison as the lead singer leans close into the mic. His voice is husky and low, words sung into the mic like a secret, and the long length of his fingers come to wrap around the stand like a lover as he loses himself in it.

Beneath the lowlights, behind the smoke, the length of his eyelashes cast a slow crawl of shadows across his face, and Iwaizumi’s heart immediately stills in his chest.

Daichi bumps into his back with the sudden stop of movement, both of their shoes squeaking loud in protest on the floor, and Iwaizumi nearly falls over.

“No _fucking_ way,” he hisses, eyes glued to the stage, and the realization hits him all at once that he is staring at no other than Oikawa _fucking_ Tooru.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I will go down with IwaHanaDai friendship.
> 
> Links: [here](http://alcheminx.flavors.me)
> 
> P.S: The symbolism of a daisy is generally new beginnings and childlike innocence, but they also represent a farewell.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3, or as I like to call it, "the author finally decides to give Oikawa some more god damn screen time."
> 
> When I tagged this as slow burn, I wasn't kidding around. Enjoy.

Oikawa.

 _Oikawa_.

Now he suddenly remembers where he had heard that name before.

Iwaizumi didn’t keep up with the music scene, really. It just wasn’t something that interested him. He tended to stick to what he liked, and he had decided what he liked a long time ago. There wasn’t any reason to him to go searching for something more.

But with a best friend like Hanamaki, it was near impossible to not know what was going on around the world at all times. His ability to be up to date and knowledgeable about everything was beyond impressive, and by now it was just an unexpected, added bonus that came with his friendship.

As much as Iwaizumi sometimes didn’t understand it, he didn’t hate it.

Sometimes, it was incredibly useful.

Like _now_ , for example.

He could only curse himself for not being able to remember sooner. He should have paid attention the first time Hanamaki slapped the magazine down in front of him on their dining room table in a fit of distress a couple years ago.

It is only the headline that he can seem to remember, only the headline making itself apparent at the forefront of his brain, but the headline itself is more than enough for him to remember why Oikawa’s name had struck a chord in him the first time he had heard it.

**UP AND COMING BAND ‘NORTHERN RIVER’ FORCED TO SPLIT – LEAD SINGERS KAGEYAMA TOBIO AND OIKAWA TOORU GO THEIR SEPARATE WAYS**

They had been one of Hanamaki’s favourite bands. Iwaizumi, himself, had never paid much attention to them – but he had been forced into hearing them played over the loudspeakers in the shop more than once while on a shift with him.

They weren’t bad, really. Not exactly Iwaizumi’s style, but a vast improvement in comparison to the rest of Hanamaki’s music choices. He could tolerate listening to their album on repeat, sometimes he even found himself tapping his foot along to a particularly good beat when he wasn’t paying attention.

Apparently, once upon a time, they had been making quite a name for themselves.

No _wonder_ Oikawa was insulted when he admitted to not knowing who he was.

He knew that Hanamaki had been beyond upset when the news came out about their split, but Iwaizumi had never really taken the time to read into why a band with so much potential had suddenly fallen out at the peak of their success, and Hanamaki had never bothered to elaborate past his initial grief.

Again, he could only mentally curse himself for not caring when he had had the chance to find out.

Staring at him now, though, Iwaizumi would have never thought he had once been a washed up musician. He looks like he doesn’t belong anywhere else. His hands look like they were created to do nothing more than wrap around the microphone stand in his grip.

He looks like he was born for this. His stance, the heavy-lidded expression on his face, the way his lips form around his words.

It is his voice that really makes it, but Iwaizumi can’t help but notice that the style is all wrong from what he is used to.

Northern River had always sounded like a little bit of a battlefield to Iwaizumi. Like two singers struggling to say two different things and never quite getting the chance to say them at all, like a language made up of nothing but angst and anger and a rush of a sound.

Whatever it is that Iwaizumi sees in front of him now, though, is anything but.

Now, Oikawa holds the stage like he owns it. There are members beside him, members behind him, but Iwaizumi’s eyes do not even have the slightest interest in concentrating on anywhere that is not his face. The bass could cut out, the drums could still, the room could fall into utter silence, and Iwaizumi still wouldn’t be able to pull his attention away from the sound of Oikawa’s voice crawling its way into his skin and cutting like silk through the microphone.

It is such a different Oikawa than the one he had seen in the shop. This is the Oikawa that Iwaizumi had expected to meet before he had opened his mouth and shattered the image– but now Iwaizumi can’t help but wish he would never close his mouth again.

It is beautiful, in the simplest of terms. It is the kind of music that makes Iwaizumi think that maybe he should start to go searching for more after all.

It is the perfect mix of sultry – seductive and confident and irresistible with the way it flows out of his lungs – the kind of music that screams _sex_ without having to scream at all.

It is so tantalizing, so hypnotizing, that Iwaizumi almost misses the melancholy of it all. It has the strangest hint of sadness underneath all of the smoke.

It almost makes him forget that he was outraged by seeing Oikawa’s face at all.

 _Almost_.

Daichi had collided with his shoulder blade, hard, and the tiny whimper of surprise he lets out with the impact is just enough to shatter the trance that Iwaizumi has let himself fall into.

“Hajime?” Daichi asks, confused, and Iwaizumi sees Hanamaki come to a grinding halt of realization in front of them not a minute later. If Daichi thinks he is getting an answer now, he is sadly mistaken.

“Holy shit,” he murmurs, eyes as glued to the stage as Iwaizumi’s were mere seconds ago, and then he is turning to Daichi and him both with raised eyebrows. “Do you know who-“

“Yeah,” Iwaizumi says breathlessly. “Northern River, right?”

Hanamaki can only give a shell-shocked nod. Daichi continues to look increasingly confused.

“Yeah…well what looks to be half of it, anyway. Kageyama is nowhere to be seen. I heard about them possibly making a comeback, but I had no clue that it had already happened.” Hanamaki squints, no doubt trying to see past the smoke clouding the stage. “Huh, actually, now that I think about it, it looks like _only_ Kageyama is missing. Kunimi and Kindaichi are still on keyboard and guitar...”

Iwaizumi suddenly finds himself wishing, for the third time that night, that he had really, really taken the time to read that article when he had the chance. He has absolutely no clue what any of what Hanamaki had just said means, but he can’t help but think it is probably important.

He kind of hates himself for being so interested to begin with.

He is caught up on the pretty face all over again. How could he forget the awful mouth that came along with it?

“I’m surprised you recognized them,” Hanamaki says, raising an interested eyebrow as he turns back to focus his attention on Iwaizumi.

He can’t blame him for being suspicious, really. He had never shown any real interest in the past.

He figures now is about a good a time as ever to fess up.

“I didn’t, really,” he sighs, lifting a shoulder in an attempted shrug. “It’s just the lead singer. As it turns out… _he_ was the one from the shop a week ago. I, uh, recognized the name when I first heard it, but I couldn’t remember where from…looks like I finally figured it out?”

Hanamaki’s eyes nearly bulge right out of his eye sockets. “ _What?_ ”

Admitting to caring enough to remember his name is bad enough. Iwaizumi does not feel like repeating it twice. The thought alone makes his temples ache.

Much to his relief, though, he doesn’t have to.

“ _What_?” Hanamaki repeats. “ _The dick piercing guy_? Wait, wait, no. That’s not the important part. The important part is that you’re telling me that one of the lead singers for Northern River was in our shop a week ago and you didn’t even _know_?”

“It’s not _my_ fault that I was the only one in the shop at the time.”

Hanamaki has the sense to at least look a little bit guilty. “You know what – no. I don’t even care. I’m just baffled over the fact that you had the gull to complain about someone as hot as Oikawa. If he walked in the shop and smashed every window and spit in my face I wouldn’t even care. I’d probably thank him.”

Iwazumi’s nose automatically wrinkles in disgust. “Okay. First of all, that’s disgusting. Second of all, that is 100% the fanboy in you speaking. I, personally, could care less about who he is. If he pisses me off, he pisses me off.”

“Right, okay. Like you don’t think he’s hot,” Hanamaki accuses, and throws in a good eye roll just for the sake of it.

Iwaizumi has to physically force himself to not let his gaze wander back to the form of Oikawa wrapping his way around his mic stand. “Is he?” he grits out, “I never noticed.”

The both of them know that it is a blatant lie, but it doesn’t stop Iwaizumi from trying.

“You’re so full of shit Hajime, I swear to g-“

“Guys,” Daichi squeaks, effectively interrupting them both, “care to explain what is going on?”

It is enough to stall the brewing argument between Iwaizumi and Hanamaki before it ignites into anything disastrous. They both turn to face him again in unison like they forgot he was ever there to begin with.

He has long since stopped his frantic eye searching around the venue, and now he is just wide-eyed and concerned.

“It doesn’t matter,” Hanamaki sighs. “How the _hell_ did you get these tickets anyway? Did you even know what they were?”

“No clue,” Daichi admits sheepishly. “They were just a gift.”

“A _gift_?” Hanamaki echoes, voice rising with newfound interest, but Iwaizumi places a stern hand on his shoulder just as quickly. The look that Hanamaki shoots him underneath his eyelashes in return is less than impressed.

Daichi’s face is already bright red with just the question, though, and Iwaizumi really does not feel like killing him tonight. Not when he is by far the most sensible one between his two friends.

Hanamaki seems to get the clue to put the meddling to rest.

“Listen,” Iwaizumi sighs, all of his frustration burning out into nothing but exhaustion. “I didn’t want to be here tonight, but now that I know it’s his show I _really_ don’t want to be here. You guys can stay, enjoy your night, I’ll just give my bracelet to someone outside.”

Daichi looks guilty enough to give in, but the only thing Hanamaki offers him in return for his words is the irritated twist of his mouth. “No way. You’re staying.”

“Makki I really don’t-“

“You _owe_ me, Hajime,” he says, quietly, and it is the way his eyes go hard around the edges that makes all argument suddenly still on Iwaizumi’s tongue.

Hanamaki does not _do_ serious. It always catches him off guard.

He is not wrong about the owing, though. It is how he had managed to get him here, after all.

_If you say you’re okay, if you insist that you’re fine, then prove it to me. You keep saying that you don’t want me to worry – but if you don’t go out, if you don’t make the effort, I’m never going to stop._

He closes his eyes for a moment, all the sound around them becoming nothing more than background noise, and lets a shaky breath escape from his lungs. “Okay,” he agrees. “I’ll at least stay until intermission.”

It is not much, but it’s something. The quiet smile tugging at the edges of Hanamaki’s mouth almost makes it worth it.

* * *

 

The VIP section is _nice_. _Suspiciously_ nice.

Compared to Tokyo, Sendai was severely lacking when it came to its nightlife. It was a city of its own, sure, but it had always been known for its beautiful architecture and nature rather than its entertainment. Iwaizumi didn’t even realize it _had_ clubs as nice as the one that they were currently seated in.

It was divided into two levels, the first a general seating area with a bar, and the second a giant dance floor in front of an even bigger stage. When he had originally heard the word VIP, he had figured that it merely meant getting to be in front row. When he had _not_ expected was to be ushered into a roped off overhang on the second floor with a perfect view of the stage by a bouncer who was, thankfully, not Bokuto.

Their seats are leather. _Real leather_.

He is suddenly not so against grilling Daichi about how he got these tickets after all. The lighting is so red in here he won’t even be able to see him blush about it and feel bad anyway.

Hanamaki bounces like an overexcited child next to him, commenting loudly about the quality of the seating, and Iwaizumi takes the momentary distraction to strike.

“Daichi,” he says, nearly a shout with how loud he has to speak to get his voice over the music, and Daichi blinks at him in question.

“Y-Yeah?”

“I wasn’t going to pry before, I really wasn’t, but this is a lot and I’m not buying the gift excuse anymore. Care to explain how you _actually_ got these tickets?”

Hanamaki immediately stops bouncing. Iwaizumi knows there is a devious smile forming on his face without even having to turn his head to look at him.

“There really isn’t any more to the story,” he sighs, scratching the back of his neck in embarrassment. “I was as shocked as you guys are.”

“So a total stranger of a customer just walked in this morning, bought a dozen flowers, threw 3 VIP tickets at you for what looks to be a sold out show free of charge, and then went on his merry way?” Iwaizumi raises an unbelieving eyebrow.

“Okay…well…when you put it like that…”

“Spill the dirt, Sawamura,” Hanamaki snaps, pushing an impatient finger into his chest.

“I think it’s because I gave him the entire flower order free of charge…” he mumbles into his shoulder.

Iwaizumi’s eyes bulge. He can’t help it. “You gave over a _dozen_ flowers away for free?!”

“ _He was really nice_!” Daichi yelps.

Iwaizumi seriously considers retracting his previous thought about him being the most sensible one out of his two friends.

“Nice?” Hanamaki asks, “Or nice to _look at_?”

Daichi’s eyebrows dip into confusion. “I don’t understand the-“

Hanamaki opens his mouth again to speak, but Iwaizumi drills a glare so intense into the side of his head that he is immediately snapping it shut just as quick. They are not going to get on the topic of Daichi’s sexuality tonight. That is an entire other problem for another night.

Hanamaki sulks beside him, but remains silent much to Iwaizumi’s relief. The entire exchange, however, only manages to confuse Daichi further.

“It’s not like I was initially _planning_ to give him the entire order for free. It’s just that he was really nice, and he was trying to do a good thing and support his friends for their first show, and he told me that he was in his last year of University and working two part time jobs and that…probably meant he didn’t have a lot of money to spare, right? He said that the tickets were the least he could do…apparently he was going to give it to some friends, but they ditched out on him last minute. I thought it’d be rude to refuse,” Daichi rushes out, a bead of sweat shining red under the flashing lights as it cascades down his temple in a panic.

Iwaizumi can only bring himself to let go of an exasperated sigh at the confession. Sometimes Daichi was so nice it bordered on concerning.

“ _First show_?” Hanamaki echoes, his lip pursing in interest. When he nearly hangs his entire upper body over the half wall surrounding the overhang to direct his attention back at the stage, Iwaizumi can’t stop himself from instinctively reaching a hand out to grab a hold of his shirt.

“Don’t fall and get yourself killed, dumbass,” he hisses, but Hanamaki only waves an unconcerned hand before leaning even further.

Like this, Iwaizumi’s view of the stage is almost completely blocked, but it does not stop his ears from picking up on what is probably Northern River’s 4th or 5th song in their set. He knows that they have all been talking ( _arguing_ ) for a while, but it doesn’t stop him from being surprised when Oikawa’s voice finishes on one final long stretch of note, and flows into a smooth stream of speech instead.

“We’re going to take a quick break,” he apologizes, voice sickeningly sweet and everything he is not as he leans into the microphone. “But please stick around and be prepared for plenty more of _Photosynthesize_ when we get back!”

Iwaizumi can practically _hear_ the wink in his voice as a chorus of ( _mostly female_ ) voices erupt into a scream around them.

“ _Photosynthesize_?” Hanamaki asks, blinking in confusion. He leans back just far enough as the band members leave the stage for Iwaizumi to feel okay about releasing his death grip on his shirt.

“Did they change their name?” he asks.

Hanamaki shakes his head, insistent. “No…no. It doesn’t make sense. Kageyama would be here. I think they’re an entire new band after all? I guess Oikawa really did go his own w-“

“ _His own what_?” Iwaizumi questions, slightly irritated with Hanamaki’s abrupt stop of explanation. When he slumps back into his seat and Iwaizumi realizes that his face has gone completely void of colour, however, the irritation quickly dies out.

He blinks down at the table between them like he is in a trance.

“What’s wrong?” Daichi and Iwaizumi ask in unison.

“The bassist,” he says breathlessly.

Iwaizumi and Daichi share a confused glance. “The _bassist_?” they echo.

“I didn’t…see him before.”

Daichi tilts his head. “Do you know him or something?”

“No!” Hanamaki shouts, slamming his forehead against the tabletop in feigned agony. It is hard enough to visibly shake the entire thing, and Iwaizumi and Daichi’s shared look of confusion only continues to grow with it.

Daichi looks to Iwaizumi for help, but he only shrugs a shoulder. _Hell if he knows._

“Is…that bad?” Daichi tries.

“Yes! Yes it’s bad,” Hanamaki mumbles, voice slightly muffled with the way it’s suffocated against the surface of the table underneath him. “I _wish_ I knew who he is. He’s so _fucking hot_.”

Iwaizumi doesn’t even have to think twice about giving Hanamaki a slap to the back of the head. His hand just automatically does it for him.

“ _Ow_ ,” he hisses.

“We thought you were upset over something _serious_ , idiot.”

Hanamaki straightens himself back up just to direct an irritated glance in Iwaizumi’s direction. “It _is_ serious, thank you very much.”

Iwaizumi wants to roll his eyes, he really does, but he doesn’t even feel like giving Hanamaki the satisfaction of knowing he has managed to annoy him. “If you think he’s so hot, then why don’t you just go over there and talk to him and do whatever it is you always do that has guys automatically falling at your feet?”

“I can’t,” Hanamaki whines. “This is different. He’s not just hot. He’s hot _and_ famous.”

This time, Iwaizumi really does roll his eyes. “This is their opening show, isn’t it? Clearly they can’t be that famous.”

“ _It’s a sold out show!_ ”

“They probably aren’t even officially signed to a record label yet. Calm the hell down,” Iwaizumi grumbles, slightly irritated at being interrupted. At this point, he doesn’t even care about what information Hanamaki was about to spill about Oikawa. He just wants him to stop whining and _do_ something already.

He looks a little nervous, actually, which is an odd look for Hanamaki to be wearing at all. Daichi clears his throat and mumbles something of a quiet encouragement to Hanamaki, but Iwaizumi completely misses it as he catches sight of a few of the band members slip out from back stage and make their way upstairs towards the bar area.

Despite all of the screaming fans, there is not a bouncer to be seen.

 _I work for the band,_ Bokuto had said.

As Iwaizumi catches the sight of a girl rushing forward to latch onto the arm of one of the unsuspecting members and Bokuto remains nowhere to be seen, he can’t help but think that he isn’t doing a very good job of it. The unfortunate band member, a skinny guy with shaggy black hair and an ear full of piercings, looks more annoyed than startled, however, and Iwaizumi watches as a taller guy with hair almost as bad as Bokuto’s come to his rescue.

He recognizes their faces slightly, even with all of the attention that Oikawa was stealing from them, and his brain automatically supplies the knowledge of their previous positions on stage. Keyboard and guitar.

If he remembers Hanamaki’s words right, then that means they must be Kunimi and Kindaichi respectively.

There is another guy with them that Iwaizumi doesn’t recognize, but with the way Hanamaki visibly chokes on his spit beside him as he finally clues into their proximity, he realizes that it probably has to be the bassist.

He _is_ pretty hot. Upon inspection, he is nowhere near Iwaizumi’s type, but it doesn’t stop him from being able to acknowledge a nice face. It almost makes Hanamaki’s outburst seem justified.

Almost.

The first thing Iwaizumi zones in on is how _tall_ he is. Even from a distance it is obvious, the way he towers over both of his band members going far beyond them both just possibly being short, and Iwaizumi can see a nice form of bicep muscle underneath the sleeve of his t-shirt as he playfully jostles the now freed Kunimi.

He laughs, low and baritone at something Kunimi shoots back, and a thick mass of unruly curl falls forward into his eyes with the gesture. Compared to Bedhead, it is a significantly nicer type of unruly, and whatever isn’t curl seems to taper off into dark undercut at the back of his neck.

His ears are stretched wide and adorned with black plugs, and Hanamaki lets out a downright _wheeze_ beside Iwaizumi at the sight.

“I’m going to die,” he declares.

“You really need to stop declaring death at every minor inconvenience,” Iwaizumi sighs. _Way to be The Boy Who Cried Wolf._

“The only inconvenience here is that my tongue is currently still in my mouth, and not on the other side of this room and being shoved down his throat.”

Daichi’s face goes bright red with the confession.

“ _Makki_ ,” Iwaizumi scolds.

Hanamaki only laughs loud in response, but it nearly gets drown out when a chorus of particularly loud screams erupt from downstairs.

Iwaizumi tries to angle his head over the railing to no avail. Well, at least he knows where Oikawa is hiding now. Time to get out of here before anything disastrous happens.

He had only promised until intermission, after all. 

“Just go _talk to him_ ,” Iwaizumi says, insistent. He needs some kind of distraction to be able to sneak out of here without Hanamaki noticing and trying to coerce him into staying longer.

“Alright, alright,” Hanamaki sighs, crawling right over top of Iwaizumi instead of asking him to move from the booth like a normal person. “Try not to miss me,” he winks, and then makes quick to slink his way over to the bassist.

The bassist perks up an eyebrow at his arrival, the bored expression on his face morphing into slight interest instead, and Iwaizumi hears him mumble a soft “Nice shirt,” under his breath as Hanamaki introduces himself.

Oh yeah. Hanamaki would be perfectly fine with this one. Whoever had the guts to compliment that hideous shirt of his was without a doubt going to get along with him.

With Hanamaki taken care of, Iwaizumi turns his attention back to Daichi.

If he made him feel guilty enough, Daichi would let him leave without problem. For Iwaizumi, getting away now is nowhere near a concern. What is, however, is the wistful look still plastered across Daichi’s face as he searches the club.

“Is he here?” Iwaizumi dares to ask.

Daichi blinks at him in surprise. “ _Huh_?”

“The customer from before, that’s who you keep looking around for, right? Is he here?”

Daichi looks considerably caught off guard at the question. Iwaizumi silently prays that he keeps this innocence forever. It is such a nice balance between all of Hanamaki’s considerable lack of.

“He….is,” Daichi admits quietly. “I uh, caught a glance of him earlier, but I haven’t seen him since. Apparently he works merch?”

Iwaizumi lifts one knee up onto the booth to peer over the railing. Downstairs is still swimming with fans, most of them collecting in what appears to be some sort of attempt at an organized line, and Iwaizumi follows it further to a booth decorated with what looks to be t-shirts. There are multiple people working it, but his eyes automatically fall onto a familiar white-haired one wearing a black ball cap. Even from the distance he can see the sincerity of his smile as he deals with a customer.

“Think I found him,” he murmurs.

Daichi’s eyes light up like an excited kid, and then he is joining Iwaizumi in leaning over the railing. Iwaizumi knows he’s guessed right the moment Daichi’s eyes fall on the guy and his eyes somehow manage to light up even further.

“T-That’s the one,” he confirms.

Iwaizumi has to admit, it’s been awhile since he’s seen Daichi this excited over something other than flowers. He’d really like to see more of it.

“Why don’t you go talk to him?” he suggests.

“I can’t-“

“You like him, right?” he asks, peering intently at the side of Daichi’s panicking face. He instantly sees the guards go up with the question.

“ _No!_ I mean…yes? I don’t-“

“Woah, woah,” Iwaizumi interrupts. “Calm down, okay? Hanamaki isn’t here, and I’m not Hanamaki. I’m not trying to imply anything. I just think it’d be a waste to not at least go thank him for the tickets, maybe make a friend out of it?”

Daichi’s eyebrows dip down into contemplation, but he at least looks a bit calmer with the words. Yes, friend. Friend was a good word choice. “I guess it couldn’t hurt…I didn’t even get to catch his name before…” he murmurs.

“There’s the Daichi I know.” Iwaizumi tries his best to shoot him the most encouraging smile he can manage. It feels a little weird on his face, but he pushes through anyway.

It seems to work, though, because with it Daichi is sliding out of their booth and getting to his feet. He takes a prolonged moment to straighten out the cuff of his dress shirt, throat bobbing anxiously, and Iwaizumi shoots him a meaningful look as he glances back his way with uncertainty.

“Okay,” he says. “I’m going now.”

“Don’t let me stop you.”

He hesitates again, a moment long enough to make Iwaizumi consider sprouting another bout of encouragement, but then he is taking a deep breath and turning on his heel to walk down the stairs.

Iwaizumi watches him go the entire way, looking incredibly out of place as he shoulders past ( _and promptly apologizes to_ ) everyone in the crowd downstairs, and a quiet smile tugs at the edges of his lips as he finally makes his way to the booth and greets the guy.

His face blooms into a blinding smile at Daichi’s arrival, Daichi rubbing the back of his own neck in embarrassment, and Iwaizumi suddenly feels significantly better about ditching out on him.

As much as he wants to leave, after all of the needed encouragement on his friend’s account tonight, he could really use a drink.

* * *

 

Hanamaki, apparently, has already found his way into the alcohol. When Iwaizumi passes him and the bassist on the way over to the bar, there is a bottle of pink liquid dangling out of his hand, and his face is close enough in proximity to the bassists as he talks for Iwaizumi to know he’s already tipsy. The bassist seems rather into it, though, large eyebrows furrowing with interest as he listens to him talk.

Hanamaki is so into it himself that he doesn’t even notice Iwaizumi walking past him. Looks promising, then. _Good for him,_ Iwaizumi thinks. He hopes Daichi is doing just as well.

The bar is relatively empty, no doubt due to Oikawa capturing most of the attention downstairs, and Iwaizumi is thankful for it as he slides onto a stool.

“What can I get for you?” the bartender asks.

Iwaizumi really doesn’t know what is in the water here, but whatever it is he really needs to start drinking it. The guy is downright _beautiful_.

It stalls the order in his mouth for a moment.

His expression is bored, impossibly so, but even the unsatisfactory expression doesn’t do anything to take away from the beauty. His eyes are the most intriguing mix of grey and emerald underneath the low lights, a set of dark, fluttering eyelashes to match, and Iwaizumi finds himself leaning forward despite himself with the sudden curiosity of whether or not it’s due to mascara or just unfairly good genetics.

The bartender clears his throat with the movement, clearly impatient, and Iwaizumi suddenly remembers his manners.

“Sorry,” he mutters, embarrassment rising high on his cheeks. He doesn’t remember ever being this bad when it came to talking to someone attractive before. Maybe he really _does_ need to get out more. “Could I get a rum and coke, please?”

The bartender nods, flipping the white dish towel that he was previously using to shine glasses over his shoulder, and turns around to pick a bottle of rum off the shelf behind him.

Iwaizumi catches a flash of _Akaashi_ on his name tag as he turns.

He can’t help but notice, also, that he has really _nice_ shoulders. The pretty ones always have been his weakness.

He sets a mixed glass down in front of Iwaizumi not a moment later, and Iwaizumi forks over a wad of cash ( _and considerable tip_ ) in return. He hopes it at least tastes good.

Akaashi lingers in front of him for a moment too long to be normal, his gaze focusing in on something over Iwaizumi’s shoulder, and the slight pinched expression that forms between his neatly plucked eyebrows suddenly looks anything less than pleased. It’s kind of nice to see that the guy has a range of emotion, after all. However small.

“What’s wrong?” Iwaizumi asks, Akaashi’s gaze becoming more irritated by the moment, and then he is blinking in what looks to be surprise down at Iwaizumi with the question.

Iwaizumi can’t really blame him. Working here, he wouldn’t be surprised if it is the first time he’s been asked a question that has to do with anything other than what his phone number is.

“What do you mean?” he asks, incredulous. His voice is really nice.

“You looked irritated…” Iwaizumi explains, slowly, suddenly doubting his decision to say anything at all.

Akaashi only stares at him longer, intense and unblinking, and Iwaizumi thinks he catches the slightest bit of confusion there. Had he really not noticed? Did nobody _else_ ever seem to notice? He had a usually expressionless face, sure, but that just meant that you had to go searching harder for what he was trying to say. Iwaizumi might not be good at words, but he had always been good at reading the unspoken ones.

Had no one really ever called him out before?

“Hm,” Akaashi hums. He gives Iwaizumi a look that looks oddly close to appreciation. _Had he passed a test or something?_ “Irritated…I guess you could say that. It’s just Bokuto and Kuroo.”

“Bokuto and Kuroo?” Iwaizumi echoes, spinning on his stool to look for himself at whatever Akaashi is so trained on.

The moment his eyes land, he knows that he should’ve known better. He knows to expect Bokuto, has learned the name by now, but his stomach drops into uneasiness the minute he realizes that _Bedhead_ is the one standing beside him. So _Kuroo_ was his name, huh?

He lifts a hand and directs a knowing wiggle of fingers at Iwaizumi. The smirk on his face makes Iwaizumi want to punch him in the teeth.

Bokuto only looks confused at the irritation forming on Iwaizumi’s face, and he waves enthusiastically.

He knew that Kuroo had to be somewhere around here if Bokuto was, but he was also seriously hoping that he wouldn’t be unfortunate enough to have to run into him.

“Fuck,” Iwaizumi grumbles, turning back around and slamming his forehead down against the bars counter-top. What had he done in another life to deserve this?

It’s hard enough to rattle his glass, and Akaashi’s shoulders jump slightly with the movement. “You know them?” he asks.

“Unfortunately,” he groans, and lifts his head back up only to down almost half of his entire glass of alcohol. The rum burns the back of his throat a little on the way down, but he bears it. He really, really needs it right about now.

Akaashi doesn’t bother to ask how. The pain apparent on his face probably says enough. “Sorry to hear that,” he offers. “I’ve been trying to get Bokuto-san to leave me alone for weeks to no avail. Every time he shows up here he tries to get me to go on a date with him. I’ve never seen someone be so horrendous at flirting in my entire life.”

Iwaizumi doesn’t doubt it for a second. The guy has absolutely zero self-awareness. He opens his mouth to offer his condolences, but the thought is quickly interrupted by a shout to his left.

“If it isn’t _Iwa-chan_! I _though_ t I saw you around earlier.”

Iwaizumi almost breaks his entire glass in half with just the sound of the voice.

He doesn’t want to look, doesn’t want to confirm what he already knows, but Oikawa really doesn’t give him much of a choice before he’s striding over and taking the seat right beside him.

Iwaizumi tosses a pleading look towards Akaashi, a quiet _save me_ , but Akaashi takes one look at Oikawa and practically runs to the other side of the bar to busy himself with another customer.

He really should’ve just left when he had the chance. Alcohol be damned.

He downs the rest of the liquor sloshing around in his hand with grief before turning to Oikawa. “What do you want?” he grumbles.

He looks _good_.

 _Really good_.

It only acts to further Iwaizumi’s irritation.

He does _not_ want to be thinking about his tousled, sweaty hair and how much worse of a job he could do to it if given the right chance. He does _not_ want to admit that the sudden hammering of his heartbeat has absolutely nothing to do with the alcohol streaming through his veins and absolutely everything to do with the slow, cocky smile tugging at the edges of Oikawa’s lips.

Oikawa had noticed him. Among the crowd, out of everyone screaming his name, he had noticed _him_. That shouldn’t make him happy. It shouldn’t. He had wanted to avoid him, right? _Right?_

God, he hates him. He hates him and his stupid, stupid face _so much_.

“So mean, Iwa-chan. Didn’t your mother ever teach you your manners?” Oikawa tuts, setting an elbow atop the counter and leaning purposefully close into Iwaizumi’s space.

Iwaizumi’s mother had taught him plenty. Not to waste your time on cocky musicians had certainly been one of them. “What do you _want_?” he repeats, again, teeth clenched tight in irritation.

Oikawa leans away again with an exasperated huff. “Can’t I just come over here and have a nice conversation with you without there being any ulterior motives, Iwa-chan? What kind of man do you think me to be?”

“An awful one. _Stop calling me that_.”

Oikawa downright _pouts_. Iwaizumi registers that it is probably meant to be cute, but all it really looks like to him is a fool of a grown man who is clearly not used to being told _no_.

“Why are you over here, anyway?” Iwaizumi sighs, rubbing at the building headache in his temples. “Shouldn’t you be busy meeting fans?”

The pout slides off of Oikawa’s face, and his eyebrow promptly skyrockets upwards with interest in exchange. “Is that jealousy I hear, Iwa-chan?” he purrs.

“ _No._ ”

Oikawa completely ignores him. Instead, he just throws a reassuring arm around his shoulder and leans in tantalizingly close again. “You know what they say about jealousy, Iwa-chan. So ugly.”

Iwaizumi shoulders him off forcefully. He deliberately does _not_ think about how hot his skin is burning everywhere that they have managed to come in contact. “ _I’m not jealous_. Why the hell would I be jealous?”

Oikawa looks offended for about half a second at being thrown off, and then the expression is gone just as fast as he leans over to steal a melting ice cube out of Iwaizumi’s empty glass. He toys with it between his fingers for a few moments, translucency of it flashing into colour underneath the lights, before speaking again. “Never mind it, you have no need to worry. Half of those screaming girls don’t even know the name of my band.”

Iwaizumi raises an annoyed eyebrow. “I didn’t even know _who you were_. How is that any better?”

Oikawa laughs, too high-pitched to be genuine, and brings the icecube to his mouth. “That’s different. Theirs is ignorance. You – _you_ are a challenge.”

He rubs the ice cube absentmindedly over the shape of his bottom lip, and Iwaizumi suddenly finds it very, very hard to look away.

When Oikawa catches him staring, his lips split open into the most satisfied smile, tantalizingly wet and bitten red with the cold. No – it was _definitely not_ an absentminded decision. It makes Iwaizumi angry at himself for ever falling for it to begin with.

 _A challenge, huh?_ Is that what Oikawa used to refer to people who couldn’t stand his presence?

“I don’t remember ever agreeing to participate,” he growls. “How is it ignorance, anyway? You used to be a part of something big a long time ago….so what? Why do you expect everyone to just automatically love you and fall at your feet the moment you come back? Are you even signed?”

He doesn’t know where the anger comes from, but he doesn’t regret it. It has been so long since someone has been able to pull such pettiness out of him. It almost feels _good._

He’s spent so much time being nothing but apathetic.

The words strike a chord in Oikawa, Iwaizumi can see it the moment he lets the icecube clatter loudly back into the glass underneath him. His left eye twitches slightly, warm chocolate becoming cold.

On stage, his expressions had been so unguarded. Here, Iwaizumi has to struggle just to pick up on the slightest crack in his mask.

“In the process of, actually.” Oikawa smiles, a sweetness to his words that does nothing but make Iwaizumi feel sick to his stomach.  “We’re….testing the waters, you could say. Making sure we’re still wanted before we give ourselves so freely.”

“Funny. Back in the shop, you didn’t seem so against giving away things freely.”

Oikawa’s smile stretches further, all Cheshire Cat, but Iwaizumi stays firmly grounded where he sits. “Well, we all make mistakes.”

It is supposed to be hurtful, but Iwaizumi does not allow it to sting. He is not the one who sauntered over here to begin with, after all. He is not the one desperate to get Oikawa’s attention.

“What about you, anyway?” Oikawa quips. “What’s a tattoo artist with no tattoos?”

This, _this is different_. This is territory that Iwaizumi is not ready to cross. “Can you not love something from a distance? Am I not allowed to love something without suffocating myself in it?”

 _That_ peaks Oikawa’s attention. Iwaizumi gets the impression that he is definitely an all or nothing kind of person.

“Sure you’re not hiding anything, Iwa-chan? Nothing I should go searching for underneath a couple layers of clothes?”

The flirting is back, insistent as ever, but Iwaizumi knows it is nothing but condescending now. Oikawa, himself, is nothing but condescending. He does not care about the flirting, does not want to allow himself to fall for it for even a minute. Not when he knows it is nothing but a game to him.

“ _No_ ,” he answers, far too quickly, and he curses himself the instant it leaves his tongue. Oikawa picks up on the desperation the moment it comes out of his mouth.

Much to his relief, though, he seems to decide to give him a break. When his eyes fall onto the form of Hanamaki and the bassist across the room, Iwaizumi realizes that maybe he’s just decided to direct his meddling elsewhere.

“Is that your piercer?” he asks.

“…Yes.” Iwaizumi almost doesn’t want to supply him with the information at all. As innocent as it is, he doesn’t trust it in the hands of someone like Oikawa.

“ _Hm_. Do you chastise him for so freely suffocating himself in what he loves, too?”

Iwaizumi isn’t sure if he’s referring to the obvious large amount of piercings he has, or the way he’s practically crawling right onto the bassists lap. He decides to take it as the piercings in hopes that Oikawa doesn’t just think he’s an ignorant homophobe. He really hopes that isn’t why Oikawa thought he had rejected him.

“I assure you that half of Makki’s piercings are for sinful purposes only,” he sighs. He wants to add in an “ _it’s not any of my business”,_ but he knows that it’ll only make him look like a hypocrite when he had scolded Oikawa for the same reason mere minutes ago.

Oikawa seems slightly amused by the confession. “Makki, huh?”

 _Fuck_. He hadn’t meant to supply a name. He hadn’t meant to give any more information than necessary. If Oikawa even _thought_ about doing anything to Hanamaki, if he even _considered_ the idea of messing with him, Iwaizumi wouldn’t even think twice about getting in the way.

“Mattsun seems to have taken a quick liking to him,” Oikawa observes. _Mattsun_ – that had to be a nickname for something. Iwaizumi was learning all kinds of names today.

“Is that a bad thing?”

“Not at all,” Oikawa smiles. “It just means less competition for me. If he’s occupied with Mattsun, I don’t have to worry about him possibly getting in the way.”

“Getting…in the way?”

Oikawa smile grows into dangerous territory. It doesn’t reach his eyes at all, none of the ones Iwaizumi has seen tonight have, but this one is particularly devious. “I told you, didn’t I? You’re a challenge, and I’m not particularly fond of losing.”

Did Oikawa really think that Hanamaki was _competition_? They had been best friends since middle school. There wasn’t anything past that title, anything more than that for him to worry about.

Why did Oikawa think his chances were so good, anyway?

Iwaizumi feels himself growing angry all over again, but as he opens his mouth to put Oikawa back in his place, Oikawa is cutting him off just as quick by getting to his feet.

A buzz of static sounds in the headset in Oikawa’s ear, a quiet murmur of voice that Iwaizumi can’t quite make out, and then Oikawa’s face is all back to business. “Looks like intermission is over, too bad. Duty calls.”

Iwaizumi is the weirdest mix of thankful and disappointed at the words.

“Try not to miss me too much,” Oikawa purrs, circling around the back of him like a lion on the hunt. “Maybe if you stick around for long enough afterwards, I’ll give you your own private show.”

Iwaizumi does not turn around fast enough to catch his expression, but he can practically hear the wink in his words. As Oikawa stalks off back towards the stage, he does not miss the opportunity to drag the blunt of his nails, somehow so gentle and yet at the same time hard enough to mark, across the back of Iwaizumi’s neck.

The goosebumps are instant.

He needs air. _Now_.

* * *

 

For a summer night, it is particularly cold. As soon as Iwaizumi escapes throughout a back door, as soon as the music he leaves behind becomes nothing more than muffled sound behind metal, he is greeted with a visible puff of his own breath trailing upwards into the night sky.

It is far too late to take a train, and he doesn’t have the money to spare for a cab. His apartment is not tortuously far from the club, but even so he berates himself for not thinking to wear more than a t-shirt. He can already feel goosebumps forming on the surface of his arms.

He figures he should just get it over with and leave already, but as his feet finally spring into movement beneath him a voice catches his attention and makes them halt just as quick.

When Iwaizumi spins around on his heel to find its source, he finds himself greeted with the sight of Kuroo.

He has not seen him since that brief moment with Akaashi at the bar, too caught up in all things Oikawa, and he does not expect to see him here of all places.

“Hey Mr. Sunshine,” he greets, mouth moving to form the words around the cigarette dangling between his lips. He is leaning casually against the brick wall of the alleyway, and Iwaizumi can’t help but feel slightly jealous at the leather jacket covering his shoulders. _He_ , at least, must be warm.

Iwaizumi is suddenly so tired, he can’t even bother to be irritated by the nickname. “Hey.”

Kuroo seems to pick up on the considerable lack of fight, his eyebrow raising in surprise, and he pulls the cigarette away from his mouth to fiddle with it between his fingers instead. A puff of smoke slips past his lips and gets lost in the night as he does. “What’s the big rush? Don’t you know it’s rude to leave before a show ends?” he asks.

“I’m tired,” Iwaizumi sighs. It is a bad answer, he knows, but it is the only word he can think of to describe the heaviness settling in his bones.

“Oikawa get to you that bad, huh?”

“You saw?”

Kuroo shoots him an attempt at what looks to be a cheeky smile, but it looks a little lackluster to Iwaizumi. Maybe he isn’t the only one who is tired.

_Why is he out here, anyway? Just taking a break?_

It isn’t really Iwaizumi’s place to ask, either way.

“I definitely saw, sorry. It was just too entertaining to even think about rescuing you from.”

Iwaizumi shoots him what he hopes to be an annoyed look. He is suddenly reminded of the thought he had back in the shop a week ago. He remembers thinking Kuroo and Oikawa seemed suspiciously close…

“Are you not irritated by it?” he asks, and Kuroo sends him a confused blink in response. He decides that further explanation is needed, probably. “By the flirting?”

Kuroo’s eyebrows climb so high Iwaizumi loses sight of them in the mess of his hair. “Irritated? Why would I be irr– _oh_. Oh god. You think we’re _dating_?” he wheezes, taking another puff of his cigarette. “That’s interesting.”

Iwaizumi really doesn’t know what to make of the response. _What kind of answer is that?_ Sure, it was an unspoken question, but he thought that he had made it clear enough. He wants to push it further, dig for more information, but he figures, again, that it really isn’t his place to ask. No matter _how_ curious he is.

“Your friend is cute, by the way. You pick good company,” Kuroo adds.

Iwaizumi blinks at him, caught off guard by such a quick subject change. “ _Makki?_ ” he asks.

Kuroo’s eyebrows furrow inward for a moment. “Hm…don’t think so? Is that Princess Peach?”

This guy’s choice in nicknaming was honestly getting ridiculous.

“…Yes?” Iwaizumi sighs. He kind of hates himself for understanding who he meant anyway.

“Nope, not him. Cute in his own right, but not my type. The other one. Stalky, blushes a lot, has thighs probably gifted to him by the Greek god’s themselves – you know who I’m talking about?”

“Daichi?” Honestly, it wasn’t a far off description.

Kuroo snaps his fingers at the information. “ _Ah_. That’s the one. Cute name, suits him.”

“Good luck with that one.”

“What do you mean? Is he straight?”

Iwaizumi thinks back to the white-haired boy Daichi had been fretting over not even an hour ago, and rubs his temples in frustration. “He sure as hell seems to think so,” he sighs.

_Even almost married a girl once and everything. Still continues to blame the breakup on cold feet._

“One of those, huh?” Kuroo hums. “How unfortunate.”

He doesn’t seem too disappointed by the information, more just stating a fact than anything, and Iwaizumi wonders briefly if the interest was supposed to be an answer for his previous unspoken question or not. If he was dating Oikawa… _would he be interested in someone else_? Did they have that kind of relationship? Or were they just….were they just….oh. _Oh_. That is a thought that Iwaizumi definitely does not want to think too hard about right now.

Iwaizumi is kind of surprised, honestly, at how pleasant it actually is to be talking to Kuroo. Without Bokuto, without Oikawa, he is actually pretty tolerable on his own. It doesn’t make him want to keep sticking around, though. He has a long walk home, and he is already so tired he feels like he’s about to fall over where he stands.

He kind of feels bad for ditching out on his friends, though. He hadn’t even stopped to say goodbye or tell them he was leaving. A sudden idea sparks in him.

“Hey,” he says, and Kuroo looks at him questionably.

“What’s up?”

“Can you do me a favour?”

“ _Depends_.”

There is far too much sexual innuendo hidden in his tone, and Iwaizumi has an instant, unwelcome reminder of the Kuroo he had met at the shop. He decides to push back the disgust at the memory for the moment. “You work for the band as a bouncer, right?”

Kuroo nods.

“Can you…uh. Can you make sure Makki gets home okay?”

He feels a little rude to be asking at all, shoving off a responsibility onto someone who is practically a stranger, but he feels a weird trust for Kuroo, and something tells him that Kuroo is not the type of guy to deny somebody help.

Kuroo hikes his shoulder, unfazed, in a shrug. “Sure. I’ll make sure your Princess doesn’t wind up in any Bowser’s castles tonight.”

It is not a bad metaphor, honestly.

"Thank you." He really is appreciative.

“What about the other one, though?”

Iwaizumi frowns. “Daichi will be fine. He doesn’t usually drink, and he’s more than sensible. Makki is the farthest from sensible you can get, and I also know he’s far past the point of tipsy right now.”

“Alright, got it. Not a problem….it’s not like I’m doing anything more exciting, anyway.”

Kuroo goes to take another puff from his cigarette, and a stray ember falls off the end and quickly burns into darkness as it falls.

“You shouldn’t smoke by the way,” Iwaizumi says before he can stop himself, and Kuroo immediately stills the cigarette in front of his mouth. “It’s not good for your health.”

Iwaizumi knows he shouldn’t criticize, knows he really doesn’t have the right to tell him what he should and should not do, and he expects nothing less than a jab at his personality in return. He expects nothing less than being called out for being so stuck up.

Much to his surprise, though, Kuroo takes one unreadable gaze down at his smoke and promptly stubs it out on the side of the brick wall. “Funny. I keep getting told that.”

Iwaizumi really does not understand the expression that flashes briefly in front of his eyes, and it is gone long before he can even begin to try to make sense of it.

“I should get back,” Kuroo decides, turning away from Iwaizumi and beginning to work his way back up the steps. When he pulls the door open and a crack of light filters into the alleyway, Iwaizumi’s eyes suddenly start a fight of their own to try and adjust to it. “I have to warn you to be careful with Oikawa, by the way. He’s not the type to step down after somethings caught his interest. ”

It is only a brief second that Kuroo turns his attention back to Iwaizumi for, only a simple sentence accompanied by a wink, and then he is watching him disappear through the door and back into a chaos of lights and people and music.

In the moment, he can’t help but think that maybe, possibly, Kuroo isn’t such a bad guy after all.

* * *

 

It is late by the time that Iwaizumi finally gets home, late enough that Hanamaki’s asshole of a cat thinks it’s appropriate to attack his ankles the minute he gets through the door for disturbing her sleep, and Iwaizumi doesn’t even have the fight left to get mad at her for it before he’s collapsing into his bed.

He is on the brink of sleep, silhouetted shapes of his bedroom furniture flitting in and out of consciousness, when he hears the front door being unlocked.

Iwaizumi knows that it is only Hanamaki, the significant lack of consideration when it comes to being quiet confirmation enough, and it is only confirmed when he hears his own bedroom door being creaked open. His bed complains loudly as Hanamaki throws himself onto it beside him.

He smells like alcohol and smoke and a cologne Iwaizumi doesn’t recognize, and he kicks off his boots onto the floor with a loud _thump_.

Well, so much for almost being asleep.

At least he had managed to get home okay. Iwaizumi sends a silent thank you to Kuroo, wherever he is.

“This is not your bed,” Iwaizumi sighs into his pillow.

Hanamaki makes a quiet, complaining noise in the back of his throat before scooting closer to Iwaizumi. He is freezing, cold seeped right down into his bones, and Iwaizumi nearly jumps right out of his skin as Hanamaki snuggles close enough to him to toss a frigid hand over his torso.

Hanamaki has always been a touchy person– with the addition of alcohol, though, it is like having an entire new limb of a human attached to your body. It isn’t even worth it trying to get him off.

Plus, it isn’t all that bad, really. Iwaizumi doesn’t mind it near as much as he pretends to.

When Hanamaki finds a place to rest his head, practically shoving his entire face into the dip of Iwaizumi’s collarbone, the puff of breath he lets out there is at least considerably warmer than the rest of him. “Can’t go in mine,” he murmurs. “Hime is in there, and I don’t want to disturb her. She looked so cute all bundled up…”

 _Hime_ is Hanamaki’s said asshole cat. Iwaizumi had always thought it was a terribly unfitting name. She is the farthest thing from a princess. Iwaizumi had been convinced, more than once, that she might be actual evil incarnated.

“I can’t believe you let a cat kick you out of your bed. No wonder she’s so awful, you spoil her rotten.”

Hanamaki makes a disapproving tutting noise, albeit a bit slurred. “Don’t be bitter just because she doesn’t like you, Hajime. She is a one man cat kind of gal.”

“Well, she sure as hell didn’t learn that from her father.”

Hanamaki tries to smack him, he really does, but with the darkness and his foggy head working against him all he ends up doing is swiping at the empty air.

“Shut up.”

Iwaizumi muffles a tired laugh into his pillow. “Speaking of…how did you fair, anyway?”

“Good,” Hanamaki hums. “He had to go back with his band, but I at least got a phone number.” He picks said phone up from his side and proceeds to wave it back and forth for emphasis, the unwelcome light of the home screen making Iwaizumi squint. “What about you?”

Iwaizumi figures that Hanamaki is probably referring to Oikawa. “He was awful as per usual.”

Iwaizumi can’t make out Hanamaki’s face in the darkness, but he knows his words have probably earned him an eye roll. “Oh, stop with that. He’s so hot you should just give it a damn chance.”

“Absolutely not. I’m not kidding when I say he’s awful, and plus, you know my rule.”

“Yeah, yeah…” Hanamaki sighs. “No musicians.”

“No musicians,” Iwaizumi repeats.

The patch of ink covering Iwaizumi’s back burns with the reminder, and he busies himself with lazily playing with the hair at the nape of Hanamaki’s neck to avoid thinking about it.

_“Maybe if you stick around for long enough afterwards, I’ll give you your own private show.”_

Despite everything, despite his rule, why does such a big part of him wish that he had bothered to stick around after all?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're curious....Oikawa's bands entire sound was based around these two songs, and essentially, this is the general feel to their music if I had to describe it:  
> [Song 1](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6V5Rv6aSnM)  
> [Song 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t95QYb0OA1Y)
> 
> Links: [here](http://alcheminx.flavors.me)
> 
> P.S: The band name, 'Northern River' is actually derived from Kageyama and Oikawa's middle school, Kitagawa Daiichi. It is what Kitagawa roughly translates to in English.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Long time no see! I have a few things to address before we dive into this chapter:  
> 1) It's been brought to my attention recently that my fanfiction was recommended on a fic rec list on Tumblr, and because of this it has gained a lot more attention. I just wanted to say a quick thank you to whoever it was that suggested it, I am incredibly flattered and eternally grateful, and thank you so much to everyone who took the time to check it out. If you're a new reader - welcome, and thank you so much for your support!  
> 2) I started University again in September, and because of this I don't have very much free time at all. I have a full time, intensive course load and also work a part time job so I find it really difficult to write in between. Because of this, updates will be slow. I'm very sorry and I wish I could get them out faster, but this is all I can do for now. My goal is once a month, but it doesn't always work out. Please stick by me, because I assure you no matter what I plan to finish this fic. I have no plans to stop writing it.  
> 3) This chapter is extra long because of the wait (almost 9,000 words!) so I hope you enjoy that. There is also hints at both a panic attack and possible abuse near the end of this chapter, so please be careful reading if either of those things bother you.
> 
> Thank you so much for sticking by me and for all of your support! Enjoy.

When Iwaizumi wakes, it is to a considerable amount of drool pooling in the crevice of his collarbone.

Hanamaki is still passed out cold, not quite snoring but breathing heavily enough against him to break the stillness of early morning, and he looks so relaxed underneath the stripes of sunlight starting to peek in between the blinds that Iwaizumi can’t even bring himself to be angry at him for the less than pleasant wake up call.

He is a tousled mess beside him, pink of his hair looking like it’s gone through a whirlwind in his sleep, shirt disheveled and hiked up high enough for the sun to catch pierced hips, pierced bellybutton, pierced nipples. The light reflects off the tiny silver balls bright enough to blind, and Iwaizumi lazily rolls over to stuff his face into a pillow in a pathetic attempt to ignore the call of daybreak.

He knows that it is just barely morning, that every aching bone in his body is telling him to just go back to sleep already, that he really doesn’t need to be awake right now, that he could really afford the extra couple hours of sleep while he has no responsibilities and the time to do it – but his relentless head can’t let him be okay with that.

He knows that all chance at sleeping in was lost the moment he opened his eyes. It is always like this. His head never seems content to let him have more than a second of blissful silence at a time.

He sighs despite himself, a heavy breath that makes his chest ache on its way out, and reluctantly pulls his complaining body out from underneath the warm cover of blankets. A quiet hiss passes through his teeth as his feet hit the floor, forever cold in the morning air even with the summer months, and he mentally curses himself for not thinking to wear something more than a pair of ratty old boxers to bed.

Hanamaki makes an annoyed, sleepy sound in the back of his throat at Iwaizumi’s departure, rolling himself over into the section of bed that he had just left in search of the missing warmth, and Iwaizumi throws an extra blanket discarded on a nearby desk chair over top of him with a roll of his eyes.

He buries himself in it immediately, cocooning himself in his sleep so he is nothing more than a tuft of pink hair sticking out, and lets out a happy unconscious sigh.

Well, at least one of them was getting a well-deserved rest. As Iwaizumi shoves an old, oversized thrift store sweater over his head and makes his way into the kitchen, he can’t help but be silently happy about the fact that between the two of them, it is Hanamaki.

The kitchen, however, taunts him with the temptation of crawling back into bed all over again the minute he steps into it. The apartment’s largest window is in the kitchen, an old creaking bay design that overlooks the back alleys of the city, and it draws in all the light of the morning at once. Everything is dusty yellows and illuminated orange, reflecting light off the shiny metal of the kitchen tap and splitting off to cast spectral little shadows across the tile, and Iwaizumi feels like he could lie down right there and sleep suspended in it forever. It makes even the tips of his eyelashes feel warm.

It has always been such a wonder to him as to how so many people can despise something as beautiful and quiet as a morning.

He barely manages to push through the tantalizing atmosphere enough to not fall back into the fits of sleep right in the middle of the tiled floor, but his hand knows better and decides to move without the cooperation of his head. As soon as it reaches the coffee maker to turn it on and the gurgle of a new pot grinding into life sounds, the unmistakable noise of Hime scattering out of Hanamaki’s room comes like clockwork.

The sharp of her nails grind across their floor with her desperate acceleration, and then the small form of her is watching Iwaizumi with blue-eyed suspicion from the kitchen entrance. The white of her fur is a dishevelled, sleepy mess, sticking up haphazardly at the top of her head and the contour of her back, and Iwaizumi is reminded of the sight of Hanamaki mere moments ago.

Speaking of Hanamaki, she has one of his discarded socks hanging from her mouth, this one bright orange and featuring a repeating pattern of sleeping pandas, and the meow she lets out around the fabric of it sounds a lot more like a muffled yell than the sound of a cat.

Socks are known to be a weird habit of hers. She carries them around like little treasures, stashing them away in the most obscure of places and encouraging Hanamaki to add the addition of mismatched socks to his already awful fashion choices, and the only time she can ever be found without one is when Hanamaki himself is drowning her in affection – almost as though they are substitutes for him until she can have the real thing again.

Iwaizumi would never, ever, _ever_ admit that he actually found the whole thing kind of cute.

Hanamaki and Hime possessed a kind of unbreakable attachment to one another that secretly made Iwaizumi thankful that he had given in to Hanamaki’s relentless pouting and puppy dog eyes the night he found her out on the streets as a stray and begged Iwaizumi to let him keep her here.

Iwaizumi and her however…well, one could say that they did not exactly see eye to eye.

Hime drops the sock to the floor with an audible _splat_ , no doubt another victim of being dragged through her water bowl, and makes quick to slink her way over to Iwaizumi.

Ah. Yes. There is one other reason she is willing to give up a prized sock.

_Food._

Iwaizumi curses himself the minute she gets close enough to strike. He is disappointed in himself for not expecting it by now. It is the same routine every morning, the same sequence of events like clockwork, and still he never manages to evade the absolute tyranny that this damn cat manages to inflict on him.

It is always the ankles. Always. Whether it be Iwaizumi causing her a minor inconvenience or a minimal annoyance, no matter what it is always the place that Hime chooses to strike first. He is surprised that he even still has the ability to grow the skin there back at all.

She lets out a growling mess of a hiss at the back of her throat before she attacks, sharp of her teeth working in consensus with her claws to nip haphazardly at the back of his heels, and Iwaizumi has to dodge her between his feet and fist his hand into a hole in his sweater to prevent using it to pick her up by the scruff of the neck and throw her outside and back where she came from for good.

Her claws are a scratch that is barely there in effort and yet hard enough to mark, and it sends Iwaizumi’s head spiraling immediately towards Oikawa.

Not quite there and yet everything in all the same way.

The long length of his fingers trailing the buzzed hair on the back of his neck, the blunt of his nails digging deep enough to send a shiver down his spine, the lingering brush of skin against skin and –

He visibly shakes his head at the thought when his arms birth goosebumps all over again, and he makes a quick point to get both Hime out of his way and Oikawa out of his head with a chorus of pointed curse words as he digs into the bottom cupboard for Hime’s food to fill her bowl with.

He does not need to be thinking about Oikawa right now. He does not need to thinking about Oikawa _ever_. He shouldn’t have let himself give Oikawa the time of day past that first interaction in the shop weeks ago.

Fuck, he should’ve stayed in bed.

Hime loses interest in Iwaizumi the minute her bowl is filled, slinking over and nearly inhaling the entire thing in one bite, and her growling is quickly replaced by an act of content purring.

For a cat that depended nearly entirely on Iwaizumi for her meals, she could afford to be a lot more thankful. Or at least, you know, let him know that she wants to be fed in a way that is _not_ attacking his feet every morning.

If she was counting on her lazy excuse of a father for her meals, she wouldn’t have lived past the first week. Hanamaki would have slept through her starvation entirely.

Iwaizumi glares at her, scratching at a new trail of blood starting to slide its way down his ankle, before his phone breaks his concentration and vibrates across the countertop.

Daichi’s name flashes bright across its surface, and Iwaizumi lazily towels off his now bloody palm and swipes past the lock screen.

“Coffee?” it asks, punctuated perfectly and so very Daichi beside a daunting time stamp of 6:14 A.M. At least he is not the only one who has a horrible habit of waking too early.

He had forgotten to plug in his phone last night, and its battery life flashes red and angry in the right hand corner underneath his gaze.

It looks a lot like how his head feels right now.

Daichi asking him to go for morning coffee isn’t weird. In fact, it is something that has become a sort of tradition in their friendship. When Daichi chooses to open shop late or take a day off and Iwaizumi doesn’t have to open at the crack of dawn, they often find themselves amongst the entrancing little atmosphere of Daichi’s shop. Asahi supplies the fresh brewed coffee and homemade breakfast, and they spend the morning talking flowers and life and loss and every other little thing that pops into their heads that day.

It is something that, truthfully, Iwaizumi really enjoys.

Looks forward to, even.

But it is everything about the red ringed circle around tomorrows date on his calendar that is currently staring him in the face that makes him hesitate to agree.

He knows Daichi knows what tomorrow is, and he knows that is exactly why he has chosen this morning of all mornings to invite him. Even with all of the good intention Iwaizumi knows Daichi has behind it, it doesn’t make him any more willing to agree to go.

He doesn’t work until noon, and he knows that he cannot bail out on a responsibility as important as his job at least, but such a big part of him wants to spend every moment of today until then holed up in his room and underneath his covers in denial of what is to come.

He had hoped the years would make it easier, but it never had.

He squeezes his eyes shut in frustration, the warmth still curling around his eyelashes doing nothing to comfort him now, and pinches the bridge of his nose with a sigh.

The red circle burns into the back of his mind even behind his eyelids, and Oikawa’s voice echoes in his head.

_“Didn’t your mother teach you any manners?”_

God, what did he know?

What would a spoiled, perfect brat like him _ever_ know?

He curses himself for letting his mind wander back to him for the second time that morning. From now on, he was going to do everything in his power to avoid him. If it is up to him, if everything works out in his favour, he will never have to deal with an unfortunate case of Oikawa Tooru ever again.

And if it is up to him, Oikawa can spend the entire rest of his life being perfectly clueless. Knowing nothing about the world, and certainly nothing about one Iwaizumi Hajime.

His phone buzzes in his hand again, struggling to make a sound around his irritated grip, and Daichi’s name pops up on his scuffed up screen for the second time.

“I have a lot to tell you about last night,” it says.

Well, that catches his attention.

Iwaizumi casts a wistful glance towards his coffee pot, dark liquid no doubt cold by now and definitely nowhere near as good as what is waiting at Daichi and Asahi’s café, and dumps it down the sink with a sigh before reluctantly going to get dressed.

* * *

 

“ _Sugawara Koushi_.”

…Is what Daichi blurts, wide awake and even wider eyed the near instant Iwaizumi walks through the door and into the café not even 20 minutes later.

Iwaizumi freezes instantly, one arm still caught in the arm of his jacket in his interrupted process of removing it, and stands in speechless confusion right in front of the table Daichi is currently sitting at. He has not even had the chance to sit down himself yet, hasn’t even managed to get out a groggy good morning greeting, and he tosses Daichi a pleading look for how his abrupt declaration broke the silence of the room far too early.

His eyes are still so heavy-lidded and out of focus with early morning sleepiness that he isn’t sure if the message even manages to land on its target properly.

“What?” he tries croaking instead. His voice sounds scratchy to even his own ears.

Daichi’s fingers are anchored so tight around his cup of coffee that if it wasn’t for the fact that it is a real mug instead of one of the shops many paper takeout ones, it would without a doubt be crushed in his grip right now.

His eyebrows dip down a little, like he is either disappointed or confused that Iwaizumi hasn’t yet come to understand what this name he has shouted but Iwaizumi has clearly never heard before means, and takes the moment to wordlessly slide another cup of coffee across the surface of the table towards Iwaizumi.

Iwaizumi moves for it instantly, discarding the rest of his jacket on the back of his chair with little concern in favor of finally sitting, and practically coils his entire body around the steaming cup. It is so warm in comparison to the frigid summer morning that he wants to drown himself in it.

The pitiful look that Daichi aims in his direction at the sight seems to halt the thought of all things _Sugawara Koushi_ for now.

“You know,” he sighs, “for a self-declared morning person you really don’t do well with mornings. Are you even awake?”

“I’m _awake_ ,” Iwaizumi slurs, eyes squinting into an attempt at a glare even though they are practically already closed. “I’m just not _inhuman_.”

They might both be morning people, but Iwaizumi does not possess the same unwavering resilience that Daichi does. He may like waking up early and watching the sun and being productive – but that doesn’t mean he is able to hop out of bed and be instantly both coherent and friendly. He really doesn’t understand how Daichi does it.

Daichi laughs, gruff and sincere. “For someone who decided to ditch out on us so early last night, I’d have figured you’d be better off today.”

Coming from Daichi, the words aren’t meant to be guilt-inducing at all, but Iwaizumi can’t help the uneasiness that begins to stir within his chest at the sound of them. He really does feel bad about leaving them, even if he was on the edge of losing all of his sanity at the time.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t-“ he begins to mumble, but Daichi holds up a hand in protest.

“You don’t have to explain, Hajime. It’s my fault for even dragging you there against your will to begin with. I’m honestly thankful that you came at all.”

The confession wakes him up a little, rising embarrassed heat to the tips of his ears for making Daichi feel like he has to apologize for _his_ own rudeness, and he rips off the edge of one of the muffins sitting in the middle of the table to distract himself.

He wishes he could explain, he really does, but even he himself doesn’t really understand why he felt the need to escape the club last night as fast as he did. He may not like social atmospheres now a days as much as he used to, but he can put up with them for the sake of his friends when the time calls for it. Hell, sometimes he can even find himself _enjoying_ them if he manages to let loose enough. If last night were an ordinary night with an ordinary band, he wouldn’t have snuck off as early as he did no matter how much he threatened to leave.

But it wasn’t an ordinary night.

And it wasn’t an _ordinary band_.

Deep down, no matter how much he tries to tell himself he doesn’t understand, he is well aware that he knows exactly why he had fled so fast. That doesn’t mean it is something that he is willing to come to terms with. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

Even thinking about Oikawa in such a roundabout way as he is now makes him so on edge that he can’t seem to concentrate. When he downs a gulp of coffee in hopes of distracting himself from it, it burns his tongue so bad on the way down that he audibly hisses.

Daichi’s face morphs into a mask of concern the minute Iwaizumi tears the cup away from his face in annoyance, the edges of his lips beginning to form their way into sentence, but Iwaizumi does not even allow him the chance.

He does not want to talk about this, and if Daichi is going to insist on not letting him apologize for his rudeness, then he is going to damn well try his best to gravitate the conversation the farthest away from the topic of him and his life and his _god damn feelings_ as possible.

Daichi had brought him here for a reason that did not involve Oikawa, but he was going to make a point to add him to the list of topics he was going to try and avoid this morning.

Distraction – he needed _distraction_.

“Enough about me,” he grumbles, skin on his lip burning with coffee scalded irritation at the effort. “What does _Sugawara Koushi_ mean?”

Daichi’s face lights up all over again, no doubt thankful that Iwaizumi has somehow managed to make his way back to the conversation piece that Daichi had blurted the minute he got here. It is clear to Iwaizumi instantly that he had not forgotten about it just because he had pitied Iwaizumi enough to change the subject.

Is this what he had meant by: _I have a lot to tell you about last night?_

“Not what – _who_. It’s his _name_.”

Iwaziumi raises an eyebrow. “ _Merch boy_?”

Daichi stops drinking his coffee long enough to start nodding with newfound enthusiasm. Ah, so he had gotten somewhere after all. Name of the mysterious customer that Daichi had a totally-obvious-to-everyone-but-himself crush on acquired.

Iwaizumi silently wishes that he were awake enough to fully enjoy the breakthrough.

“How’d it go?” he asks, even though the goofy smile on Daichi’s face is telling enough already. The question immediately spirals him back down to childlike shyness all over again.

“Um,” he starts, rubbing the back of his neck. “Good? Really good? Great, even?”

“Yeah?”

“He was really happy I showed up? And really thankful for the flowers…oh! That reminds me,” Daichi pauses, reaching underneath the table and into a bag by his feet.

When he comes back up with an arm full of beautifully wrapped Forget-Me-Not’s, Iwaizumi’s breath gets caught in his throat. He knows what these are for, but knowing almost makes it worse. He wishes that he could be more thankful for Daichi and all his never-ending kindness, but he can’t help but dread how it makes him have to come to terms with the darkest and deepest parts of himself that he will never be ready to face.

Daichi slides them over onto Iwaizumi’s side of the table cautiously. “I grew them special for you, and Asahi was kind enough to wrap them for me this morning. I think…I think it’s time you stop leaving Hyacinth’s.”

 _Stop asking for forgiveness and start looking for acceptance_ is what he really means. Iwaizumi is silently thankful that he isn’t cold enough to say it out loud. He may need to hear it, but it doesn’t mean he’s ready to. He’s not ready to hear a lot, if he’s honest, and he’s even less ready to admit all that he should.

“Thank you,” he says quietly, pushing away the coffee in front of him with a sudden loss of appetite. He places the flowers gently on his lap, careful to not look at them too hard. He doesn’t trust his emotions, not now. Not this early in the morning.

“Are you going to see him again?” Iwaizumi asks quietly, toying nervously with the edges of the tablecloth now that his previous panic has returned. He wants the topic of conversation as far away from himself as possible.

“Suga?” Daichi asks, and Iwaizumi’s lip curls a little in amusement to recognize they are already on nickname basis.

Deep down, Iwaizumi knew that when Daichi had texted him this morning saying that he had a lot to tell him about last night, there really wouldn’t be anything juicy. It wasn’t in Daichi’s character, and it was likely just a way of getting him here to begin with, but Iwaizumi knew that Daichi was still genuinely excited to tell him about what happened after he left.

Maybe he didn’t have stories like Hanamaki did to tell, but Iwaizumi was happy for him either way.

“I think so,” Daichi admits. “I would like to.”

He looks straight at Iwaizumi when he says it, eyes saying a lot more than his words ever could. _If you’ll be true to yourself, maybe I’ll try to be too._

It’s a start, anyway.

Iwaizumi’s phone vibrates angry in his pocket, breaking the peaceful moment, and Hanamaki’s goofy display picture flashes across the screen as Iwaizumi opens the text message.

“Where R my boots??? I can only find 1,” it reads, and Iwaizumi can’t help but sigh.

Sometimes, Hanamaki was really hopeless without him.

“Makki?” Daichi guesses, smiling around the edges of his cup as he takes another sip of coffee.

Iwaizumi groans in confirmation. “He can’t find his boots, apparently. The same pair of boots that he likely kicked underneath my bed last night in his drunken stupor.”

Daichi laughs a little, always so genuine, before rising up from his seat to walk Iwaizumi to the door. “Well, I won’t keep you then.”

They stand in comfortable silence as Iwaizumi works himself back into his shoes and jacket, careful not to crush the gifted flowers in the process, and Daichi holds the door open for him on the way out when he’s finished.

Iwaizumi had already said his thank you’s, but somehow it still doesn’t feel like enough. He is caught between blurting out another one or trying to send a silent one through eye communication alone, but Daichi saves him the trouble by pulling him into a tight hug.

“Good luck tomorrow,” Daichi says, sincere, and Iwaizumi is thankful for the fact that Daichi is not able to see his face when tears start to collect at the corners of his eyes with the words.

* * *

 

By the time Iwaizumi helps Hanamaki find both his boots and he is done grilling Iwaizumi about every possible detail about last night in his now coherent state, they are already halfway through their night shift. Apparently Kuroo had been generous enough to pay for a cab free of charge to get both Daichi and a very intoxicated Hanamaki back home, and it had taken Iwaizumi far too much energy to convince Hanamaki between customers that _no, he and_ _Kuroo did not have a thing and he really was just being generous_ and _no, he didn’t know whether or not he was single._

He knows the endless pointed questions and the teasing is mostly just Hanamaki trying to get a rise out of him, but even knowing that can’t stop his blood from instantly spiking into irritation the moment he begins. Its Hanamaki’s twisted way of getting back at him for leaving so early, he knows that deep down he really is appreciative that Iwaizumi was worried about his safety.

And…and he also knows that all Hanamaki’s teasing about Kuroo being attractive and questioning about his relationship status also can’t be all that serious. Not when he’s spent the entire time not pestering Iwaizumi being glued to his phone and smiling like a madman down at the screen that without a doubt has words on it from the bassist from last night.

It’s kind of odd, seeing Hanamaki be so seriously invested in one person for longer than a night, and although he can try to justify it over the fact that he likely didn’t get enough time with him last night to truly satisfy, Iwaizumi can’t help but feel like somethings different this time.

For once, it felt like Hanamaki was doing the chasing instead of being the chased – if only Iwaizumi knew what that was like.

When it was Oikawa doing the chasing, Iwaizumi wanted to be anything other than the chased. He wanted to be anything other than another piece in Oikawa’s stupid games.

God – why had he allowed his mind to wander back to him so many times today? Hadn’t he promised himself to let it go? Hadn’t he told himself that he was putting an end to this before it truly began? He needed to. For the sake of his own sanity, _he needed to_.

“Hanamaki,” he grumbles, the words coming out shorter than he had intended in his desperate grasp for distraction, and Hanamaki snaps his head up on cue to send him a confused look.

“Ah – yeah?” He asks, eyes concerned enough with Iwaizumi’s sudden change in tone that they do not leave their spot on Iwaizumi’s face even when his phone buzzes loud across the countertop beside him.

It make’s Iwaizumi feel bad instantly – taking out his own pent up irritation and frustration on the person who deserves it the least, and he lets out an agitated sigh to try to regain some sort of calm before speaking again.

“Are you hungry?”

Hanamaki blinks, slow like he is still trying to process how such a simple question was born out of such a serious tone, before deciding it is safe to turn his attention back to his phone. “I’m always down for food,” he shrugs, finger swiping past lock screen to reopen a conversation.

Iwaizumi’s stomach lets out an irritated growl, like now that he has suddenly returned to all his senses and isn’t too busy worrying about Hanamaki or Kuroo or Daichi or _Oikawa_ his body has decided to remind him that yes, he does indeed need to provide it food in order to survive and yes, he should have definitely provided said food hours ago.

They are reaching the quiet part of the evening shift and he doesn’t have any more appointments booked, anyway, so it really couldn’t hurt to listen to his body for once.

“Alright,” he sighs. “What do you want? I’ll go get us something.”

Hanamaki takes a beat too long to answer, smirking down at his phone in quiet conversation, and Iwaizumi is just about to snap at him for not paying attention when he saves himself at the last second.

“Can I go get it?” he asks, fingers tapping speedily across keyboard. He doesn’t even pull his eyes away from the screen long enough to aim the question towards Iwaizumi.

“ _Why_?”

“No reason,” Hanamaki shrugs. “I’d just like to go get some fresh air.”

 _You’re not the only one_ , Iwaizumi thinks. He can’t help but be a little suspicious of Hanamaki’s sudden interest in the task, especially since it involves _moving_ , which is very much _not_ an interest of Hanamaki’s.

“Is that all?”

Hanamaki smirks harder down at his phone, corner of his lip curling up in amusement, before he catches the unbelieving tone of Iwaizumi’s voice and realizes he better start making a better case for himself. “ _Yes_ _that’s all_ ,” he sighs, exasperated. “Don’t go all Detective Hajime on me. Plus, if anybody comes in while one of us are gone I can assure you they’re going to be more interested in getting a tattoo than a piercing. They always are.”

It’s a valid point, which just makes Iwaizumi curl his lip in irritated defeat. “I don’t trust you to pick our food. If I leave this up to you, we’re both going to end up with food poisoning before the night is over, and might I remind you we only have _one_ bathroom in here.”

Hanamaki rolls his eyes. “ _You_ pick the place then. I’ll just go get it.”

“McDonalds?” Iwaizumi offers weakly. Unfortunately, there are only so many cheap places.

“I thought you said you _didn’t_ want to get food poisoning,” Hanamaki smiles, cheeky, before pulling himself off his chair and dodging a half-hearted swipe from Iwaizumi on the way to the door.

“Shut up,” he grumbles, because Hanamaki really isn’t all that wrong.

Hanamaki casts one more wistful glance at his phone screen before shoving it into his jacket pocket, and pulls open the door with a loud rattle of overhead bell. “The usual, then?” he confirms, and Iwaizumi nods in approval before Hanamaki ducks his way out the door and into the night.

It isn’t a far walk from their shop to the nearest fast food strip, and Iwaizumi is thankful that he doesn’t have to be left alone with the potential of another disaster like last time for long. In the meantime, he decides to busy himself with cleaning his tools from the day’s work, humming softly to himself as one of Hanamaki’s not-so-awful music choices plays throughout the empty shop.

It feels like only mere moments of blissful silence before the overhead bell is chiming with somebodies entrance, and Iwaizumi’s back goes rigid with surprise.

Surely…it couldn’t be Hanamaki already?

“One second!” he croaks, toweling off a now inky hand with a nearby rag as he rushes over to the front counter, but then his feet are coming to a grounding halt as his eyes focus in.

He shakes his head – once, twice, three times for good measure – in a desperate attempt to wake himself from a bad dream, because there is no way what he is seeing right now is real. There is no way that he is having the misfortune of being alone, once again, with no other than Oikawa Toru standing in the entrance of the shop.

Seriously, what had he done in another life to deserve having to go through this not once, but _twice_?

He cranes his head past the view of Oikawa, still in disbelief that he is really there, in search for either Bokuto or Kuroo or some other equally as annoying counterpart, but this time he is surprised to find that Oikawa appears to be totally alone.

Totally alone and…looking really uncomfortable?

As he watches Oikawa meet his eye and shuffle back and forth in uncharacteristic awkwardness, he can’t help but think him being alone can mean anything good. He’s not sure how to feel about the fact that when their eyes met Oikawa looked a little…relieved? _Happy_? Had Oikawa been hoping he would be here? He tries not to think about it too hard.

Unfortunately for Iwaizumi, whether he was a nuisance or not Oikawa being in the shop meant that he was a potential customer, and being a potential customer also more unfortunately meant…some sort of a _welcome_ was in order.

“What do you want?” he grumbles in place of a greeting, because he really does not have enough energy or patience to go through this ordeal again. Why was it that every time he thought he was free from Oikawa, he popped back up in his life like some incurable disease?

He knows that he looks confused, he can feel the furrow of his eyebrows himself, but he can’t help it. He really can’t wrap his head around why Oikawa would ever think to return to the shop, and furthermore, why he would return _alone._

Oikawa seems to have the sense to look a little guilty, neatly plucked eyebrows dipping down with Iwaizumi’s harsh greeting. “Is Makki here?” he asks, voice raspy.

“Makki?” Iwaizumi echoes, instantly suspicious and immediately on guard. Oikawa’s sudden interest in Hanamaki at the bar comes flooding back to him all at once in a reminder, and he can’t help but suddenly feel protective.

It must show on his face, because Oikawa’s complexion suddenly goes a little pale around the edges. “You said he was your piercer, right? I was…hoping to get a piercing.”

Of all the times for Hanamaki to be wrong about a customer wanting a tattoo over a piercing, now was surely the worst. Idiot.

“He’s not here,” Iwaizumi grumbles, and then turns away from Oikawa to make his way back towards his work station. “And he won’t be here anytime soon, so go home.”

Screw professionalism. When it came to Oikawa, Iwaizumi didn’t give a damn.

He makes it about two steps before Oikawa’s voice is halting his feet to a sudden stop with a dull shriek.

“Wait!” he nearly shouts, the tone far too desperate to be coming out of a mouth like his, and when Iwaizumi reluctantly turns his attention back to him it is to the sight of embarrassed flushed face and nervously wrung hands.

That wasn’t normal, was it? Iwaizumi might not know Oikawa well, but he feels as though he’s seen enough of him by now to recognize that he is acting…weird? _Really weird?_

“Please…do you know when he’ll be back?” he pleads.

_Pleads._

Okay, this was _definitely_ weird.

“No,” Iwaizumi says slowly, mouth forming cautiously around the word as he watches Oikawa’s face fall into panic with the answer. Had he looked this frazzled when he first walked in? Iwaizumi curses himself for not paying attention, especially when it is becoming increasingly obvious that there is something very… _off_ about Oikawa right now.

He seems completely sober, nothing about his words or his stance or his face alluding to a substance playing any factor, and somehow that just makes Iwaizumi start to worry even more. _More_. He is _worrying_? About _Oikawa_? _Oh god, he is worrying about Oikawa._

But how can’t he be? There has not been one cocky smile or inappropriate attempt at flirting since the moment he stepped through the door. His hair is not styled to perfection, and his clothes don’t look like they came to life off the pages of a fashion magazine, and…and he is shaking? A small nervous shake that starts as just a tremor in his fingers, but the longer the silence between them stretches the worse it becomes until Oikawa lets out an unconscious, panicked wheeze that even catches himself off guard and Iwaizumi realizes he really, _really_ needs to say something and quick.

“Hey,” he starts, voice as soft as he can bring himself to make it, and it is enough that Oikawa seems content to settle his gaze on Iwaizumi’s face instead of frantically darting his eyes around the room. Is this what a panic attack was like? “Hey…why do you need a piercing so badly? Are you okay?”

Iwaizumi had thought there’d been something weird about that night that Oikawa, Bokuto and Kuroo had stormed into the shop on some kind of desperate mission to get Oikawa pierced, but now it is suddenly occurring to him that maybe the reasoning behind it lied further than just an intoxicated dare or stupid joke.

He couldn’t fathom up with any reason as to why it was so important, and he really doubted that Oikawa was going to tell him the truth even though he had asked. Maybe it was something that he was never going to know, or maybe it was just something that he hadn’t yet earned the privilege of knowing.

The question flips a switch somewhere in Oikawa instantly, like he had not even realized that he had let his neatly crafted mask fall to begin with, and Iwaizumi physically watches as he tries to snap the pieces back into place one by one. When all that comes out of it is a strangled attempt at a genuine, confident smile, it only makes Iwaizumi feel sick to his stomach.

“Oh!” he pipes up, “I’m fine, Iwa-chan, why would you think otherwise? I’m just wanting to spice up my look a little, is all. Haha.”

Iwaizumi suddenly isn’t sure whether or not he wants to strangle him for trying to lie to him, or give him the hug he probably so desperately could use right now.

His hands clench and unclench tightly at his side with internal conflict, but he stands his ground.

“How about a tattoo?” he asks.

Oikawa’s mask breaks again for a mere second with the question, a mix of surprise and hesitance, before he’s snapping it back into place just as quickly. “A tattoo?” he echoes.

“Yeah,” Iwaizumi confirms, pushing himself forward to take a seat at the front desk and pull out his portfolio. He flips it open to a page by random and gestures Oikawa forward. “If you just want to spice things up anything will do, right? Why not a tattoo instead?”

Iwaizumi had exactly 0 intention of giving Oikawa a tattoo tonight, especially in whatever state he is currently in, but if Oikawa is intent on lying to him about what is going on then he is going to try everything he can to get him so caught up in this web that he has no choice but to admit the truth. He refuses to believe that he is so prideful that he will let himself get permanently tattooed just for the sake of keeping information from him.

Oikawa takes a hesitant step forward toward the counter, standing there in awkward confusion before Iwaizumi pushes the portfolio closer to him and he gets to clue to bend himself over to inspect it. His hands are still a little shaky as he cautiously flips through the pages, eyes darting between design and door and Iwaizumi and back all over again, and Iwaizumi suddenly realizes far too many things at once.

First of all, this close is close enough for Iwaizumi to really inspect Oikawa in his current state, and his current state involves nervously chewed up nails that he _knows_ were not there before, and certainly not there last night with the way Oikawa had dug them so firmly into the back of Iwaizumi’s neck when he left. Which meant…something in the last 24 hours had made him like this, and whatever it was was enough to make him so nervous he bit them down to near skin. It was not just that, either, because secondly Iwaizumi could also make sense as to why his eyes look so hollow and out of place on his face.

They are puffy. _Puffy._ Like he has been _crying_.

It is unmistakable.

Hanamaki and Daichi had not mentioned anything bad happening at the show last night after he had left, and he knows that they would have been sure to if they had witnessed something. What had happened to Oikawa in the short time afterwards?

Iwaizumi suddenly feels even guiltier for leaving, although deep down he has to admit that even if he had stayed he probably wouldn’t have been able to prevent whatever… _this_ is.

The puffy eyes and bitten nails are not all, either. The most startling thing that had started to click into place suddenly for Iwaizumi is that it is not nervousness that is making Oikawa glance back and forth towards the door every few seconds…it is genuine _fear_. Whatever it is he is looking for, _whoever_ it is he is looking for, he is _afraid_ of it.

He opens his mouth to speak, intent now more than ever to make Oikawa admit to what is going on, to admit why he is in his shop alone in the middle of the night to begin with, but the sound of Oikawa’s soft voice stops him.

It is not a tone that he is used to hearing, but it is nothing short of genuine.

“All of these are yours?” Oikawa asks softly, long length of his finger running cautiously across an intricate design of a begonia flower in front of him. He does not look at Iwaizumi when he says it, eyes too caught up with roaming over the carefully placed pencil strokes.

It is such an intense look that it suddenly makes Iwaizumi feel like the vulnerable one. Like he is suddenly naked, and Oikawa is seeing right through him.

“Y-yes,” he stammers despite himself. “I’m not the only tattoo artist here though…let me get you another one?”

He may not be doing this with serious intention, but he suddenly feels a little insecure about only showing his own work.

“No,” Oikawa says, firm, as he flips over a page in interest. Iwaizumi can’t help but notice that he seems significantly more relaxed than he was moments ago. He is silently thankful that he is so focused on the portfolio in front of him, because he can physically feel how hot his face is suddenly growing as Oikawa inspects it. “This is fine. You draw a lot of flowers.”

“I…do,” Iwaizumi admits sheepishly. It is not as though it is the first time he’s being called out on it, but he really doesn’t realize how often he gravitates towards them until somebody points it out. Again, he can’t help but feel a little embarrassed about it.

“Hm,” Oikawa hums, and leaves it at that. Iwaizumi is half expecting a _why?_ that so often comes alongside the observation, but he is silently happy that Oikawa doesn’t push it further. He is surprised, because Oikawa does not come across as the kind of person who is content without knowing the entire story, but nevertheless he is happy. Whenever people ask, he can never really seem to find the right answer to explain, anyway.

Maybe because they say all the things he is afraid to? He doesn’t quite know.

Oikawa has not glanced towards the door or anywhere other than the pages in front of him for the last couple of minutes, and as he leans closer to inspect a tiny detail on one of the spines of a collection of roses Iwaizumi had drew, Iwaizumi has to stop himself from reaching out to tuck the curl of hair that falls forward with the movement back behind Oikawa’s ear.

He hates that he is so attracted to him, that every time he thinks he knows a side he is shown a hundred more, that even all the nasty parts of his personality make him want to go digging deeper. He hates that he is so unconsciously and hopelessly caught up in someone that he had told himself to keep his distance from.

He feels no different than a mindless fan. He squeezes his eyes shut for a moment in quiet irritation at himself for feeling the most he has in years for the worst person he could have chosen. When he opens them again, he is ready to finish what he started.

“Oikawa,” he says, softly, even softer than the first time, and it sounds foreign enough around his voice that it has Oikawa tearing his attention away from the portfolio instantly.

When he lifts his head up they are tantalizing close, not in the teasing way that Oikawa had put them in so many times before, but in a genuine kind of accident. Neither of them move regardless, brown smothering grey, breath caught in throats, Oikawa’s attention is focused solely on Iwaizumi with the call of his name.

“Oikawa,” he repeats, again, suddenly feeling a little lightheaded at their proximity. “Oikawa, are you really okay?”

Oikawa’s mask completely shatters with the question, and this time – this time he doesn’t even bother trying to recollect all the pieces. His eyes suddenly start going wide and misty around the edges, his tongue wetting his lips in anticipation to speak, and it is the moment he gets the confidence to open his mouth and begin to talk that the door beside them slams open and crashes into the wall.

Oikawa nearly jumps out of his skin entirely, words getting caught in his throat and coming out in a panicked almost-shriek, and then he is flying away from the desk in an instant and backing himself up and away from the entrance.

Iwaizumi nearly knocks over the chair he had been sitting on with how quickly he gets up in response, rounding the corner like he’s ready to attack whatever it is that Oikawa’s staring at in disbelief, but his legs automatically freeze where they stand when he realizes that the source of it is both significantly taller and significantly broader than him.

It is a tall, large built man with brown cropped hair and an intense green gaze focused in entirely on Oikawa. He is dressed incredibly formal, dark business suit complete with a headset in his ear and shiny black dress shoes, and he only tears his eyes away from the sight of Oikawa to cast a surprised glance at the closing door behind him – like he had overestimated his strength entirely and not realized he had sent it crashing into the wall.

In other words, he hadn’t meant to put so much force into it on purpose. The realization sends a shiver down Iwaizumi’s spine despite himself.

“Oikawa,” the man speaks, voice deep and lacking any hint of emotion at all. “Why are you here?”

Oikawa looks less fearful and more irritated by the sight of him now, which calms Iwaizumi nerves significantly. “Why are _you_ here, Ushijima?” he hisses back.

Ushijima furrows his eyebrows in genuine confusion. “It is my job to know your whereabouts,” he says, matter of fact.

“I told you I was going out, you don’t have to follow me around everywhere like some sort of damn guard dog!” Oikawa snaps, eyes ablaze, and Iwaizumi stands in stunned silence between them as he realizes it is the first time he’s ever seen him genuinely angry.

“It is my job to know your whereabouts,” Ushijima reiterates. “It is late, and you were not permitted to leave. You know you shouldn’t be in a place like this, what were you planning to do to yourself? Your Mother isn’t going to be happy. We’re leaving now.”

The way he says _“A place like this”_ has Iwaizumi instantly curling his lip in irritation. He didn’t like this guy the moment he walked through the door, and even less now that he is not so subtly insulting his entire workplace. He knows it isn’t the greatest looking place in the entire world, but he can’t help but feel a little protective of it.

He knows it isn’t his place to say anything, though, so he bites his lip to hold back any nasty words.

“I’m not leaving with you,” Oikawa spits.

Ushijima’s facial expression does not change even a little bit. “Your Mother is waiting for you in the car. You are leaving with me.”

Something changes in Oikawa again with the words this time, irritation melting its way back into genuine fear at the mention of his mother. If it wasn’t Ushijima…is that what Oikawa had been so afraid of before? Is that who he had been glancing anxiously at the door for every few seconds?

It makes Iwaizumi angry, having to sit back and watch this person scare the wits right out of Oikawa with a single sentence, and he doesn’t need to think twice before his feet are moving for him. He stands in front of Oikawa like a barricade, height differences be damned, and latches his hand firmly around Oikawa’s wrist to pull his form behind the shelter of his back. Oikawa’s eyes go a little wide around the edges with the contact, but he obediently lets himself be moved.

He doesn’t care anymore whether this is his place or not, he can’t stand by and just watch it.

“Didn’t you hear him?” he grits out between clenched teeth at Ushijima. “He _said_ he doesn’t want to leave with you, so get out and leave him alone.”

He realizes too late that he’s squeezing Oikawa’s wrist too hard with his own irritation, and he loosens his hold enough to run an apologetic swipe of his thumb across the underside of it. He can feel the hole that Oikawa is burning into the back of his head with his gaze, but he can’t bring himself to turn around and meet it when he’s too busy burning a look of his own into the expanse of Ushijima’s emotionless face.

Ushijima is looking at him now like he hadn’t even registered that there is another person in the room, and that only pisses Iwaizumi off more. Was this really the first time he had bothered to chance a look in his direction since he entered?

He blinks, slow and unamused at the form of Iwaizumi and then back and forth to his and Oikawa’s connected hands.

“Who are you?” he asks, and the way he says it makes Iwaizumi’s blood boil instantly. It sounds far too little like a question and far too much like an insult for his taste.

He clenches his jaw, ready to rip this guy into shreds, but Oikawa must sense his irritation because not even a second later he is taking a step forward in front of Iwaizumi and pulling himself free of his grip.

“It’s okay, Iwaizumi. Thank you,” he says, soft enough for only Iwaizumi to hear, and then he is ducking his head down and walking alongside Ushijima towards the door without another word.

Ushijima turns with him instantly, following him closely with a still unchanged expression until they are both outside the door, and Iwaizumi watches them gather into a parked limo outside. From his place in the shop he is only able to catch the smallest glimpse of another figure inside, a woman made up of dark hair and even darker eyes that immediately looks familiar to Iwaizumi though he suddenly can’t quite place her, and then the image of her is gone just as fast as the door slams shut behind Oikawa and the car vanishes into the night.

He feels sick to his stomach all over again, like he should have done anything other than let Oikawa walk away, but the quiet thank you he had said before he left held far too much meaning for Iwaizumi to do that. He knew Oikawa was safe, physically at least, but he couldn’t help but feel a little lost. There was so much that he still didn’t know, and so much he didn’t understand about what had just happened.

He had wanted to protect Oikawa so badly, but he wasn’t even sure what it was he should have been protecting him from.

Just when he had come to terms with being okay with never thinking of him again, he had to pop back into his life and give him a million and one more things to think about.

It is all so unfair.

A headache starts to bloom at the edges of Iwaizumi temples, and he takes an exasperated seat back at the front desk. Oikawa had flipped back and paused his portfolio on the image of begonia flowers, and Iwaizumi quickly shuts it and shoves it out of view to try and not think about it.

The begonia flower - dark and unpleasant thoughts, the distraction from happiness, _a warning of future misfortunate._

His head hits the table in front of him in defeat the exact moment the bell above the door chimes, and Hanamaki strolls in with a fast food bag clutched in his hands.

Iwaizumi isn’t even hungry anymore. He had forgotten about it entirely.

_Why had Hanamaki taken so long?_

“Why did a limo just pull away from here?” Hanamaki asks, unzipping his jacket and finally turning to look at Iwaizumi. “And…why do you look like you just went through hell again?”

Iwaizumi lifts his head up enough to cast an irritated gaze in Hanamaki’s direction. His hair is considerably tussled and his lips are a little swollen, and it becomes increasingly obvious all at once that he went out to get more than just _food_.

If his fries are cold, Iwaizumi is going to kill him.

“You leave,” Iwaizumi growls, standing to snatch his bag of food straight out of Hanamaki’s hands, “at the absolute _worst_ of times.”

Hanamaki opens his mouth to protest, finally looking a little guilty, but Iwaizumi only waves him off as he goes back to his own desk to eat.

He has far too much to think about right now.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next update should hopefully be in December during holiday break!
> 
> Links: [here](http://alcheminx.flavors.me)


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